UNIVERSITY
OF PITTSBURGH
SmM"^ Vault
>.' A\ks -» CT
%'yiM"-^ K1537K1
LIBRARY
ELIZABETH DENNISTOUN KANE
May 12, 1836— May 25, 1909
STORY OF JOHN KANE
OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, NEW YORK
BY
ELIZABETH DENNISTOUN KANE
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS
PRINTED BY THE
J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY
FOR PRIVATE DISTRIBUTION
I92I
BRIEF BIOGRAPHY OF THE AUTHOR
ELIZABETH DENNISTOUN KANE
May 12, 1836 — May 25, 1909
ELIZABETH DENNISTOUN KANE
Elizabeth Dennistoun (Wood) Kane was bom
at Bootle, a suburb of Liverpool, England, May 12,
1836. William Wood, her father, was a young Scotch-
man connected with the banking house of Dennistoun,
Wood & Co. Her mother, Harriet Amelia Kane, was
a beautiful American of the New York branch of the
family of the founder of the town of Kane, Pennsyl-
vania. She was the third of six children. When she
was six years old, she found her ideal in the gallant
young cousin, Thomas Leiper Kane (later General
Kane, Commander of the Famous Bucktail Regiment
of the Civil War), who, wounded in France's Revolu-
tion against Louis Philippe, found welcome and healing
in her father's house. His kindnesses won her childish
heart; and the French doll he gave her was never for-
gotten. August 12, 1844, she landed with her parents
in New York to make America their future home. Two
years later her mother died.
For seven lonely years, she found comfort and com-
panionship with her studies and poets, brightened by
occasional glimpses of her idolized cousin, Tom. At
twelve she said once to her sister, " Why, I thought
you all knew I intend to marry Cousin Tom Kane ! "
On April 21, 1853, in Dr. Potts' Presbyterian church in
New York, he placed on her finger the band of gold
which she carried to her grave, prized more than any
other earthly treasure. Then followed four years of
tranquil happiness in Philadelphia, during which time
her husband in his indignation over the " fugitive slave
3
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
law," sacrificed one of his salaried positions; and, soon
after, laid down the other to go on a special commission
from President Buchanan to Utah and avert an impend-
ing rebellion and massacre of the earnest but mis-
guided Mormons.
On his return, his fortune and positions gone, she
uncomplainingly took her two babes with him to seek
a new home and employment in the then wilderness of
McKean and Elk counties. Eight months in each year
were spent among the mountaineers at Upland, a farm
on the McKean county line near Rasselas. The remain-
ing months were spent in Philadelphia preparing
reports and prospectuses to induce railroads and other
industries to develop that mountain region. When he
enlisted as the " first volunteer soldier of Pennsylvania,"
to quote Governor Curtin's words, for the suppression
of the rebellion, she and her two children, Harriet and
Elisha, were cared for by his aunt, Ann Gray Thomas,
on her farm at Kingsessing, now part of Philadelphia,
Her third child, Evan, was born there.
The elder children long remembered those days
when for supper they could have bread and molasses
or bread and butter, but not both. For Uncle Sam paid
his soldiers in money worth less than fifty cents on the
dollar. Even for her children, the soldier's wife was
frugal in using the charity of his kind relative. Not
having money to give to the hospital of the Sanitary
Commission, she solicited among the neighboring far-
mers fruit, vegetables, eggs and milk; and many a
wounded soldier blessed the kind hands that prepared
the delicacies, and the sweet voice that spoke hope and
consolation. Each sufiferer reminded her of her own
beloved soldier, whose rare furloughs occasionally
4
ELIZABETH DENNISTOUN KANE
brightened her days of anxiety. In 1863 baby Willie,
who in manhood adopted his father's name, was born.
In 1864, too broken by wounds, imprisonment and
disease for army service, her husband was restored to
her. Once more he took the agency for the McKean &
Elk Land and Improvement Company, and repaired
to the forest-clad hills to found the town of Kane. Until
a house could be built, the wife and children stopped
at the old Barrett (now Comes) farm on Marvin Creek.
The difficulty of obtaining carpenters in that wilder-
ness, or the money to pay them, delayed the house build-
ing. So she took her children to dwell with him that
autumn and winter in a new stable, cradling in a manger
wee Willie. In the winter, wolves howled around the
door and sprang against the walls; provisions often ran
short; and once, while she lay helpless with erysipelas,
the roof took fire above her head. She kept house, taught
the children their lessons, nursed her husband's sick-
nesses, and, at the same time, was his secretary and book-
keeper for his lumbering and land business. In the
first years of Kane, no doctors were nearer than Wilcox
and St. Marys; so she and the General ministered to
many sick, who love her to this day. Hope of financial
prosperity was beginning when exhaustion from his
congressional campaign in 1872 made his wounds break
out afresh; and the doctors ordered him West lest he
die. Business was hastily closed out and the home
broken up, sending the two elder children to relatives,
while the two little boys went with their parents to
Utah. Kind care by the grateful Mormons brought
back the husband to comparative health. In her book
" Twelve Mormon Homes " she relates her experiences
among these kind-hearted heretics. Some one in Kane,
5
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
having previously abstracted from the mails a large
check, changed its date, forged an endorsement, drew
out all their money, and created a large bank overdraft.
Hastily they returned for another struggle with poverty.
She pawned her silver to make good the overdraft. The
panic of 1873 made their railroad and coal lands unmar-
ketable, and left them without income, burdened by a
large debt incurred in cheap currency, and, by the law
of ^"ji^^ made payable in gold, five dollars for two. Six
years more of toil and self-denial brought them out of
the most pressing debt and placed them once more in
control of Kane and some timber tracts. One son was
through college and able to help a little.
She heartily endorsed her husband's proposal to
resume the attempt to exclude the liquor traffic from
new parts of Kane by restrictions more effective than
those which they had been compelled to abandon in
1867. An attempt on the son's life, which an anonymous
threat showed to be a lawless protest, did not weaken
either parent's determination. For many years the
validity of the restrictions was unquestioned, and, as a
consequence, the people who came to dwell in Kane
were of the temperate and moral kind, who valued
their lots none the less because under prohibition. Such
settlers made Kane a city of virtuous, happy homes,
and the resulting thrift and industry brought prosperity
and profit in place of the loss which both she and the
General expected to follow their adherence to the path
of righteousness.
During these years the dear old Aunt Thomas —
General Kane having refused to let her leave her for-
tune to him — built the Presbyterian church, wherein
they and their children might worship. A touching in-
6
ELIZABETH DENNISTOUN KANE
scription on the memorial tablet alludes to this choice,
not of Mammon, one of the gods of the world in which
we dwell, but of the service of the Lord. In the roof,
the General placed a window to commemorate the
text, " Consider the Lillies How They Grow," with
which Mrs. Kane comforted him through the dark days
of adversity. Then, slowly, began the return of pros-
perity. They brought new settlers to the vicinity in
1876 to 1879. Timber lands were sold to lumbermen;
and the Erie railroad took part of the abandoned rail-
road and coal lands. Another aunt, Mrs. Constable,
left them her Philadelphia house. It seemed like a
return of youth to her who was once a city-bred student.
With her daughter as a schoolmate, in 188 1, she resumed
her course in the Woman's Medical College, and gradu-
ated as a physician in 1883. Her younger sons later
passed through the Jefiferson Medical College.
Again she suffered the keenest of grief, for pneu-
monia from one of his wounds took her husband to a
better home in December, 1883. The Philadelphia
house was sold, and a new life began; a life in which
the spirit of her husband, his aims and aspirations, took
his place as the object of her love and care. She under-
took a class in the Presbyterian Sunday School. The
effort to protect Kane against more saloons expanded
into license-fighting and prohibition campaigns. In
one of these campaigns, her son was abused because the
lessee of her Thomson House had a license. Next year
she stipulated for no license, although advised) that
financial ruin would result. Even the old wines, stored
in time past in the cellar for medicinal uses, were
quietly brought out and destroyed. Her membership
in the W.C.T.U. became the delight of her life. She
7
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
was chosen president of the local union, and then of the
county union. She went as a delegate to State and
National Conventions, both of the W.C.T.U. and of
the Prohibition party. Everywhere at her side was her
vivacious and high-spirited daughter, the white hair
above whose youthful face told how she, too, was being
purified through sufifering. The contemplated sacri-
fice of revenue from the Thomson House was less than
had been anticipated, Mr. Kemp coming back from
Ebensburg to run it successfully as a temperance house.
From unexpected quarters money began to pour in.
Industries which she had helped to foster made Kane to
grow marvellously; and oil was struck near Mt. Jewett
on her lands.
Next to the loss of her husband she felt the death of
her father October i, 1894. Ever since marriage they
had exchanged weekly letters, each telling the other
not merely of daily happenings, but also of hopes and
fears, trials and victories, and innermost workings of
the heart and soul.
In 1896 she was again bereaved, the only daughter
falling dead in church while leading a prayer meeting
and singing the missionary hymn "Speed Away!"
Temperance and philanthropic work became still
dearer to her. Her three daughters-in-law with one
accord strove to perform the work of the absent one.
The Woodside Hospital, undertaken by her son
Evan in memory of his father's wounds and suffering,
had been moved into Kane and much enlarged, partly
by her assistance. It became an incorporated institu-
tion under the name of Kane Summit Hospital Asso-
ciation. Its benevolent efficiency was largely increased
by the adoption of non-alcoholic medication as a rule
ELIZABETH DENNISTOUN KANE
of the institution. This radical departure was far in
advance of the times, but is now in line with the best of
practice and highest medical authorities. When
patients became too many for even its enlarged accom-
modations, she donated to it the Thomson House.
There it still continues the work of healing. She was
its treasurer and most active member of the board
of managers.
During the last five years of her life her health
began to fail ; and the sons compelled her successively to
abandon her Sunday School class, the National and
State Conventions, and finally her official relations with
the hospital. Winters had been spent in Florida and
California, each of which places had reminded her of
the rest and beauty of Heaven. To the last she retained
in full possession all her faculties, her love of study, and
her keen interest in philanthropy and social reforms.
She was studying Spanish during the last winter of her
life. She was an expert at fancy-work, and had some
skill in wood-carving. Her literary works were prin-
cipally essays on politico-economic reforms, far in ad-
vance of the times. To train her children, she and her
husband followed the precepts of Jesus instead of Solo-
mon. No blow from rod or hand nor lashing of tongue
ever gave pain to the tender little beings whom God
entrusted to their protection. So, in their family, love
working no ill to the dear ones became the fulfilling
of the law of the home.
One bright spring morning, the 25th of May, 1909,
after a night of happy visions of those she loved in the
better world, she blessed her remaining children and
grandchildren who were gathered around her bedside,
in the home she had made dear to them, bade them
9
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
good-bye, and fell into a tranquil sleep, from which she
never waked again in this world — a sleep so gentle
that no one could tell just when she passed from this
life to the next.
Mrs. Kane's youth was surrounded by the refinements
of wealth, her married life by the perils and privations
of the frontier, and her later years by the growing com-
forts of one whom the Lord has blessed. Measured by
her benefactions, her wealth in these later years has
been placed high ; measured by her income, it was but
moderate ; and, measured by her self-indulgences, very
small. She possessed the pearl of great price, and had
much wealth laid up " where moth and rust do not
corrupt." Her friendships and associations, desires and
ambitions were likewise of a permanent nature, being
connected with her religious, philanthropic, and patriotic
work. She prayed, waited, and worked for the coming
of the Kingdom, when the Divine will shall be done on
earth as it is in Heaven. She found God to be im-
measurably pure, holy and loving; abhorrent of sin, and
full of pity for the sinner; unwilling that one of these
little ones should perish. She followed Him as a dear
child, combating every form of evil, and tenderly pity-
ing every evil-doer. She lived to see slavery abolished
before the cannons of the North, and the gates of liquor-
dom breaking down before the peaceful army of pro-
hibition and the thunders of God's wrath.
7ff^iam_
STORY OF JOHN KANE
OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, NEW YORK
" The book is completed and closed, like the day,
And the hand that has written it lays it away.
Dim grow its fancies, forgotten they lie.
Like coals in the embers to darken and die."
Should I not print this, I wish it be kept for my
eldest grandson and beloved child, Elisha.
SA^aJe/iy<z^^ mm^
WHAT I KNOW ABOUT THE KANES.
At the beginning of this year of grace, 1901, I am
left, the last of the descendants of our immigrating
ancestor, John Kane, knowing anything whatever about
our genealogy. I am linked through my own recol-
lections, and my husband's books of notes and the let-
ters of our predecessors, with old John Kane and his
children, one of whom, James, I saw when a child. So,
at the opening of the 20th century I will try to jot
down what I know or remember hearing of our kindred
who belonged to the 17th and i8th. I must ramble
without much connection in my story, I fear. And,
first, for my authorities.
Somewhere about 1850 — half a century ago, when
I was a girl of fourteen — my father, William Wood, my
mother's cousin, the Hon. John K. Kane, of Philadel-
phia, and his second son, afterwards my husband,
Thomas L. Kane, were bestirring themselves actively
about our family history. I think that my Cousin
Tom, as I then called him, was the moving spirit in the
matter. For him, his father wrote his autobiography,
now in my possession. He persuaded his great-aunt,
Mrs. Thomas Morris (who was born Sarah Kane),
to write a charming narrative of her reminiscences.
He induced Great-Uncle James Kane to write long
letters to his niece, Mrs. John Constable, from which I
subsequently extracted such passages as were reminis-
cences of his father and mother, copying them out in
13
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
a dark-blue covered book with gilt clasps, now in our
library. He made my father give him such recollec-
tions as he had of my mother's uncles. These are also
repeated in my father's printed autobiography. He
followed his own father's example by visiting the neigh-
bourhood of the old Kane estate in Dutchess County,
New York, and talking with those who still remem-
bered (with hatred) the Tory Kanes. He had spent
months at Eaton Hall in Norfolkshire, England, with
our old kinsman, Archie Morrison, and heard his anec-
dotes of his boyhood days at his Uncle Kane's. He
gathered the recollections of Chancellor Kent and his
son. Judge William Kent. He collected letters of the
different children of old John, and preserved them in
our Family Book. He made inquiries in Ireland, based
upon the information he had gathered, and obtained an
exceedingly interesting letter from Mr. John O'Hara,
my great grandfather's nephew, as well as some infor-
mation from the then Consul at Belfast, Mr. Valen-
tine Holmes. The originals of these letters are in the
Family Book.
At the time of my husband's death he was corre-
sponding with the head of the O'Kanes in Ireland,
Francis de Vismes Kane, of Drumreaske, who, how-
ever, could not afford much information of value to us.
I helped him to the best of my ability by collecting
genealogical tables of Kane and O'Neill descents. All
these are copied in the Family Book.
Lastly, from " The Annals of the Four Masters "
and Burke's " Extinct Peerages " I picked up matter
relating to the O'Neills and O'Kanes, as well as the
14
WHAT I KNOW ABOUT THE KANES
O'Haras, and from Burke's " Landed Gentry " and
other volumes in the old Philadelphia Library. Burke's
Genealogies have been called the Bible of the English,
but he is very inaccurate. As a sample, take the Rose
Magennis, v^ho was daughter of Sir Arthur Magennis,
first Viscount Iveagh, by his wife Sarah, daughter of
the " Great Earl " Hugh of Tyrone. In the Magennis
genealogy (Extinct Peerages, page 348) Rose is said to
have married first Moelmurry Oge O'Reilly, and sec-
ondly, Melaghlin O'Kelly. Yet, in the O'Neill Geneal-
ogy (Extinct Peerages, page 607), she is given as
the first wife of Sir Shane O'Neill and mother of his
heir, Henry, through whom the estates passed to his
only child, Rosa, who married Randal MacDonnell,
ist Marquis of Antrim. Burke gives no other Sir
Arthur Magennis who could have been the father of
another Rose Magennis at that time. For O'Neill's
wife. Rose Magennis, predeceased him, as he married
a second time and died in 1617. Rose Magennis' eldest
brother was born in 1599, so she must have been older
than he to have married Sir Shane O'Neill, yet not
old enough for Sir Shane to have been her third hus-
band. The Rose Magennis who married O'Neill was
the daughter of the first Viscount Iveagh — ^yet the same
woman is set down as married to two other men, accord-
ing to Burke. Where these great people who have title
deeds, and charter-rooms to keep them in, and to whom
a correct genealogy is so important, make mistakes so
gross, it is no wonder that we cannot be sure of our
descent, as no one knew or cared much about our ances-
try until long after John O'Kane quitted Ireland. Fires
15
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
of persecution had destroyed old parish churches with
their records, and the laws that confiscated the property
of Irish Catholics, especially those in rebellion, handed
their lands over, either to the politicians of the ruling
side, or to those members of the family who would for-
swear the ancient religion and become Protestants.
Consequently, when we go back into the 17th
century, we pass from certainty into tradition respect-
ing the descent of John Kane (of Sharvognes, Shar-
vaugh, or Scharvaugh, Dutchess County, New York),
from the O'Neills of Clanaboy.
Who were the O'Neills, and why do the Kanes wish
to claim descent from them? The O'Neill pedigree,
which I have copied into the Family Book, goes back
to a chief or king, monarch of Ireland at the close of
the 4th century, the rule of whose dynasty was inter-
rupted for a time by that of the usurper Brian Boru!
When one comes down to comparatively modern times,
say about 1215 A.D., we find two O'Neill brothers; one
of whom, Prince O'Neill Roe (Roe means Red), be-
came ancestor to the O'Neills of Tyrone; the other,
Hugh Duff or Dubh (Black) was King of Ulster, sixth
in descent from the monarch, Daniel Ardmach, and
died in 1230. This Hugh Dufif was ancestor of the
O'Neills of Clanaboy. His grandson, Aodh-Buidhe,
Yellow-boy Hugh, King of Ulster in 1260, recovered
from the English the territories in the provinces of
Down and Ulster, called after him Clan-oadh-buidhe,
anglice Clanaboy, and had, for his chief castle, Eden-
dufT-carrig, now Shane's Castle. The last of this royal
16
WHAT I KNOW ABOUT THE KANES
house, who bore the title of King of Ulster, was Donald
O'Neill, who died in 1325.
" Edan-dubh-cairge " was destroyed in the time of
Henry VII of England, 1490. In the days of Queen
Elizabeth it was owned by Bryan O'Neill, who was
treacherously slain by Essex, and he was the last Lord
of Clanaboy. Queen Elizabeth had granted half of
Antrim to Essex, and in the endeavor to obtain pos-
session of it he " lured Sir Brian O'Neil of Clanaboy
into the Castle of Belfast — then, after a merrymaking,
treacherously seized upon him, his wife, his brother
and his retainers, and put them all to the sword, two
hundred in number." (Walpole's " Kingdom of Ire-
land.") Queen Elizabeth considered that Brian had
been cruelly dealt by, and divided his property between
his sons Conn and Shane. Sir Shane O'Neill was the
eldest. He built Shane's Castle on the site of Eden-
duff-carrig. Sir Shane had joined Hugh, Earl of
Tyrone, in rebellion, but submitted in 1586, and died
in 1617.
Although the Clanaboy O'Neills are thus shown
to be the older and legitimate branch of the O'Neills,
they are overshadowed by Hugh O'Neill, Earl of
Tyrone, known as the Great Earl. He was the second
Earl, but when he went into rebellion against Eliza-
beth, though brought up in her court, he repudiated
the title, claiming that of The O'Neill as the greater
one. He was, however, the grandson of an illegitimate
O'Neill, Matthew, son of Con Baccach O'Neill, the
first Earl of Tyrone. This Matthew was created Baron
Dungannon, 1542.
17
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
Hugh, the Great Earl, after many vicissitudes of
fortune, fied to Rome in 1607, where he died in 16 17.
He had sons who distinguished themselves in exile;
but two of his daughters, of whom he had four, interest
us. His first wife was a daughter of Sir Brian Mac-
Phelim O'Neill, from whom he was divorced. By his
second wife, Judith, daughter of Magnus, and sister
of Red Hugh O'Donnell, he had, among others, a
daughter Sarah, who married Sir Arthur Magennis, the
first Viscount Iveagh, and she had a daughter Rose,
who married (as his first wife) Sir Shane O'Neill of
Shane's Castle, thus uniting the two families. Earl
Hugh's second daughter was the first wife of Sir Donal
Ballagh O'Kane, who divorced her when he quarrelled
with her father. Her name is left blank by Burke,
but Francis de Vismes Kane, who claims to be his direct
descendant, wrote to us in 1883, that it was either Rose
or Una. As her niece (who married Shane O'Neill)
was also named Rose, this is quite probable. But it
must be borne in mind that, among the rebel Irish,
Ireland was spoken of as " The Little Black Rose," or
" Dark Rosaleen," and therefore the great frequency
of the name Rose may have had some patriotic meaning.
We have a family tradition that Evanne O'Kane
was descended from Sir Donal Ballagh O'Kane, but we
have no legal proof. I observe that Francis de Vismes
O'Kane's pedigree, drawn up in 1715, starts from " a
son " of Donald Ballagh, giving no name, so perhaps
we have as much right as he to claim our descent from
another son of Sir Donal.
The arms we use are gules, three salmon fishes
18
WHAT I KNOW ABOUT THE KANES
hauriant, argent, with three mullets in the corners. In
heraldry these mark a third son. The crest is an arm
embowed, holding a sword proper. The motto : " Fide
et amino."
These we derive from a cornelian seal which was
the property of Capt. Bernard Kane, brother of our
immigrating ancestor John, and a bookplate, also his,
which was brought to America by my Great-Uncle
Charles Kane, on his return from a visit to England and
Ireland in 1784 or 1785. Bernard Kane will be spoken
of further on. The seal and bookplate passed to Judge
John K. Kane ; were given by him to Dr. Elisha Kent
Kane when he went to China and the Philippines. Be-
fore he left, Robert P. Kane, his brother, had the book-
plate copied by Mason, a Philadelphia engraver.
Elisha lost the originals.
Francis de Vismes O'Kane says that these are pre-
cisely the arms of his family, only that, finding a still
older coat in a MS. of 1584, he discarded the mullets,
or as he thinks they should be, " estoiles," or stars, but
wishes he had not done so. He carries them as a descend-
ant of Sir Donal Ballagh. These are the arms borne,
with slight variations, by all of the O'Cahans, Keanes,
Kanes, and so forth, descended from the ancient race.
He says that these simple arms are old, and stigmatizes
as " barbarous " those modern ones on the cenotaph of
Sir Richard Kane in Westminster Abbey.
Quoy (pronounced Covey) O'Cahan, from whom
I believe Sir Richard to have been descended, was the
third son of Shane (John) O'Cahan, chief of the Sept,
and grandson of Donal O'Cahan of Coleraine, in Lon-
19
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
donderry. His arms were three salmon hauriant, one
argent and two or, crest a mountain cat, saliant proper;
Motto : " Inclytus virtute." I learn from all authorities
that the genealogies given are unreliable, and I incline
to believe that Sir Richard was a connection of ours,
though most certainly not the near connection of John
and Bernard, as claimed by Bernard. Sir Richard was
born at Duncane in the Barony of Toom, Co. Antrim,
Dec. 20, 1666; died Dec. 19, 1736, and was buried in
the citadel (or capital) of the Balearic Isles. John
O'Kane, our emigrating ancestor, was only two years
old at this time, and by no possibility could his younger
brother Bernard have held the conversations with him
which he, " Uncle Barney," repeated to Uncle James
Kane. Sir Richard's father and grandfather were each
Thomas O'Kane. Bernard called Sir Richard his
" uncle " : if so, his father's name would have been
Evanne, not Thomas. His bust is on the cenotaph,
and the features strongly resemble several of the Kanes,
while his character resembles those of Elisha K. Kane
and Thomas L. Kane. He was born in the immediate
neighborhood of John Kane's birthplace, so that there
is a likelihood that they were akin. The coat of arms
carried on the cenotaph is the same attributed by Burke
to the O'Kanes, Chiefs of The Route and Limavaddy,
who were represented by Sir Donal Ballagh O'Kane,
but are said somewhere to have been borne by an O'Kane
who became a Conde of Spain. Quite probably. Sir
Richard, during his Governorship of Minorca, obtained
these arms himself from Spain. They are:
Azure, on a fess per pale gules and argent between
WHAT I KNOW ABOUT THE KANES
in chief out of the horns of a crescent a dexter hand
couped at the wrist and apaume, surmounted by an
estoile, between on the dexter a horse counter saliant,
and on the sinister a lion rampant, each also surmounted
by an estoile, and in base a salmon naiant all argent; on
the dexter side three lizards passant, bend sinisterways
gules and on the sinister an oak tree eradicated vert;
over all an escutcheon argent charged with a cross cal-
vary on three grieces proper. Crest, a cat-a-mountain
rampant proper. Motto : " Felis demulcta mitis."
It was this crest and motto that General Thomas L.
Kane suggested that his sons should adopt, as an emblem
of his having founded the new House of Kane in the
so-called " Wild-Cat Country " of the Pennsylvania
Mountains. It was, therefore, only a fancy of his own,
not an inherited crest.
The explanation of the curious coat-of-arms is
as follows:
" Derry," in Irish, means an oak wood, and the " oak
tree eradicated vert " shows that the shield-bearer was
of the dispossessed O'Kanes of Derry. The three croco-
diles refer to his descent from the Egyptian princess
Scota (and therefore also from the O'Kanes of Antrim) ,
through Ir, the third son of Scota and Milesius. The
three mullets in heraldry indicate a third son, and the
mullets and estoiles look so like each other that they are
sometimes mistaken for one another. The centre of the
shield carries " over all " an escutcheon of pretence,
which is borne by a man who marries an heiress. In
this case it is a cross calvary on three grieces, that is,
a cross on three steps. If one could find out what family
21
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
carried the arms of this heiress it would show some
indication of the personality of the owner of the shield.
The moon with the cusps turned up indicates a fight
with the Moors. The " hand apaume," or palm for-
ward, is the Red Hand of Ireland which is borne by the
O'Neills, but I also think indicates a baronet. The
swimming fish refers to the fisheries from which the
O'Kanes derived revenue.
Sir Walter Scott says that many clans descended
from the great Clan Chattan (Chathain, Cahan) bore
the Mountain Cat as their emblem.
Returning to Sir Donal Ballagh O'Kane, husband
of Rose or Una O'Neill, daughter of the great Earl of
Tyrone, his genealogy runs thus : Magnus, Chief of the
Sept, killed in 1548, was succeeded by Roderick, who
died in 1598. This Roderick married Mary, daughter
of The O'Donnell, and their son was Sir Donal the
" Ballagh," or '' Freckled." He became chief of the
clan in 1602, succeeding Shane, after three other chiefs
who intervened, Donogh, Manus, and Roderick, his
own, i.e., Sir Donal's, father.
Sir Donal was imprisoned in the Tower of London
in 1608, although he had made his submission to the
Crown. I tell farther on how he got there. He had
received knighthood at the hands of Sir Arthur Chi-
chester, the Lord Deputy, 28th June, 1607. His estates
were confiscated and he died, it is stated, in the Tower;
another authority says, in Dublin Castle. I have often
heard Judge Kane tell the story that our ancestor, The
O'Kane, humorously remarked that he would be the
first of the family not to die of gout in the head. This
22
WHAT I KNOW ABOUT THE KANES
he said when imprisoned in the Tower; and this would
of course apply to Sir Donal's anticipation of his prob-
able fate.
We have, or rather had, for I fail to find it just now,
a paper in Latin drawn up by some priest, which states
that Evanne O'Kane's grandmother was Mary O'Don-
nell, great-grandniece of Owen Roe O'Donnell. This
Owen Roe O'Donnell could not have been the cele-
brated Owen Roe, for he only died in 1629. But the
paper gives an incidental corroboration of our claim
to be descended from Sir Donal O'Kane, since his
mother and Evanne's grandmother were both Mary
O'Donnell. Query: Were they the same woman?
The similarity of the coats-of-arms borne by Francis
de Vismes Kane of Drumreaske, claiming to be de-
scended from Sir Donal, is another coincidence.
We can, however, prove nothing; but for that mat-
ter I find that Burke merely states Kane of Drum-
reaske's claim, so that the one is no more authentic than
the other.
The O'Cahans were a powerful and very ancient
tribe, fighting under the suzerainty of the O'Neill
Kings of Ulster, and their chiefsoftenintermarryingwith
the O'Neills. Their territory extended from Lough
Foyle to the River Bann, and they possessed several
strongholds — the most noted of which were the castles of
Limavaddy and Dungiven, County Derry, and Dunse-
verick in County Antrim. I used to hear when I was
young that we were " O'Kanes of the Routes." But the
O'Kanes do not seem to have held the Routes long
23
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
They captured and held them at times from their
hereditary enemies, the MacQuillans. " The Routes "
in Antrim comprehended the Baronies of Dunluce and
Kilconway: the chief's seat being at Dunluce. The
O'Kane chiefs of the Route mentioned in The Annals
of the Four Masters had among their names one of fre-
quent occurrence, " Aibhne," which was pronounced
Ayevnee, and is anglicized into Evanne. A feminine
form of the name occurs in 1508 as Aibhilin (Eveline).
She was the daughter of Thomas O'Kane and wife of
Owen Roe O'Neill.
Dunseverick (of which Dr. Evan O.N. Kane made
a rough water colour drawing, from a photograph
brought from Ireland by Helen Shields Stockton) is
described as on a bold rock projecting into the sea,
near the Giants' Causeway. Traces of the old fortifi-
cations still remain.
In the blue-bound book to which I have formerly
referred will be found extracts from the Four Masters,
containing every reference to the O'Kanes in their long
Annals of Ireland. They show perpetual fights and
marriages among the O'Cahans and with the O'Neills,
O'Donnells and MacQuillans. They also show that the
O'Kanes' country formerly included Derry, Coleraine
and part of Antrim. It was nearly all confiscated by
Queen Elizabeth's commissioners, and those of James I
finished the work. But the O'Kane chiefs, though be-
coming outlaws, did not sink into " common men."
Among King James the First's efforts for the
" pacification " of Ireland was the destruction of the
24
WHAT I KNOW ABOUT THE KANES
old system of holding land. The old Brehon laws were
to be abolished, and the English system introduced.
" Accordingly, when Tyrone and the other chiefs of
Ulster renewed their submission to James and received
their letters-patent, he compelled them to accept as
defined freehold estates their own demesne-lands only,
and to give up all claim to the rest of the tribal land,
otherwise occupied, only reserving to them a fixed rent-
charge out of these lands, for which their irregular
' cosherings ' were committed. The sub-chiefs were
confirmed in the land occupied by them, which
was defined in the same manner, and accepted as an
estate in fee subject to the payment of the rent-
charge." — ^Walpole.
" A decision of the Queen's Bench in Dublin in an
ejectment suit ruled that the law of Tanistry and Gavel-
kind was nothing but 'a lewd and damnable custom';
and that land was descendible only according to the
limitations of English law. The immediate result of
this was that the northern chiefs found themselves
plunged in litigation. Tyrone had a lawsuit with
O'Kane in respect of his seignorial rights over O'Kane's
territory; and, on the case being tried by the Council,
it was conveniently discovered that neither party had
any right to the subject matter in dispute, but that it had
been vested in the Crown since 1570!
" Sir John Davis had instituted a galling system of
espionage over Ulster, so that Tyrone complained that
' he could not even drink a full carouse of sack, but the
State was within a few hours advertised thereof.' In-
25
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
suited by the King's officers, he appears to have dropped
some incautious words to Lord Kelvin, and the latter
seems to have had some secret conversation with Tyr-
connell. There is no reason to suppose that this vague
talk was in any way serious ; but, whatever it was, Lord
Howth, who was admitted by the government to be
unworthy of credit, managed to obtain an inkling of it,
developed it into a cut-and-dried plot to seize the Castle
and murder the Deputy, and embodied it in a letter,
which he purposely dropped at the door of the council-
chamber. Tyrone, who was shortly to appear in Lon-
don, on the hearing of the appeal in the suit of O'Kane,
received information that it was the intention of the
government to arrest him on his arrival in England."
He and Tyrconnell fled with their families to the con-
tinent, eventually reaching Rome. Tyrconnell died
there the following year, and Tyrone, broken and blind,
in 1617. " In the meantime, O'Kane had been put on
his trial for treason, a charge for which there does not
seem to be a shadow of foundation. But, as a Donegal
Jury had recently acquitted Sir Neal O'Donnel, it
was considered unsafe to try to obtain a legal conviction
in Ulster, and he was forwarded to the Tower, where
he afterwards died." — Walpole's Kingdom of Ireland.
The Act of Attainder passed Anno 11, 12, 13 Jacobi,
included O'Kane among the list of conspirators men-
tioned in the letter of March 19, 1607.
The Annals of the Four Masters give the year 1608
as that of O'Kane's imprisonment in the Tower.
Docwra says that he submitted to the English in 1602.
26
WHAT I KNOW ABOUT THE KANES
He was knighted by Sir Arthur Chichester, the English
Lord Deputy, on June 27, 1607, and died in 1627. Sir
Donal's eldest son died without issue in 1642 at Clones,
" foully murdered by an English officer to whom he
had surrendered." He had been surprised by an am-
bush while reconnoitering. His name was " Donal
Givelach of the chains." A daughter, Margaret, mar-
ried a son of Quoy Ballach O'Cahan, the same whose
arms so nearly resemble ours. Our ancestor Evanne
may have been Margaret O'Cahan's son. At any rate,
as children say, we are "warm" when we hunt for our
ancestry in the family of Sir Donal " the freckled."
As the Kanes of Drumreaske start their genealogy from
an unnamed son of Sir Donal, and as our arms bear the
mark of the third son, we may choose, with equal plausi-
bility, to consider ourselves descended from a third son
of Sir Donal. As thus :
Sir Donal O'Cahan married Rose or Una O'Neill
3d son or daughter Margaret m. son of Quoy
O'Cahan
Evanne O'Kane
Bernard O'Kane m. Martha O'Hara
John, born 1734, m. Sybil Kent
Sir Donal's ancestry goes back to 1349. In our
Family Book I copied it out, together with the gene-
alogies of O'Neill, O'Donnell and MacDonnell, show-
ing the family alliances with the O'Kanes.
I do not think we shall ever obtain any more light on
our ancestry than I have written out. The history of
27
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
the chiefs of the clans really ends with the flight of the
Earls and the imprisonment of the O'Kane and other
chiefs in the Tower. Walpole gives a dismal picture of
the wholesale confiscations in Ulster by Arthur, Lord
Chichester, the King's Deputy. Disheartened and dis-
possessed, refused the exercise of their religion, forbid-
den to marry Protestants, the men capable of bearing
arms went by hundreds to the continent, where they
became distinguished in the armies of France, Spain
and The Netherlands. Those who remained occasion-
ally rose in revolt, as in 1642, and were as brutal to
the settlers who occupied their old lands, as the English
were to them. One Manus O'Kane was especially noted
for his cruelty. The strife became puzzling, as the
Catholic Irish in many instances stood by the Catholic
Kings, Charles II or James II, whose predecessors had
so cruelly oppressed them. Some of the Anglo-Irish
threw in their lot with them; others with the English
under Cromwell or under William III after him.
Whichever way the fighting went the land was ravaged.
"When the rebellion of 1642 was put down and the
land confiscated, re-divided and colonized," says Wal-
pole, " it was found impossible to expel a nation, root
and branch. In spite of all that persecution could do,
the old proprietors still clung, in numbers of cases, to
their old country, and wandered about their old do-
mains as vagrants, or were admitted by the new owners
as tenants at will. The younger fled to the bogs and
swamps and swelled the ranks of the Tories. There
they lived a lawless life of brigandage, robbing and
28
WHAT I KNOW ABOUT THE KANES
murdering the settlers and destroying their property.
Stern measures were adopted to put them down. They
were stalked by regular parties of armed men, smoked
out of their caves, and killed without mercy. A price
was set upon their heads, as upon those of the
wolves; but the wild country was too difficult of
access for the government to succeed in exterminating
them."— Walpole.
Such was the condition of Ulster when Evanne
O'Kane, John's grandsire, was born. We shall never
know more of him, I fear, but he was probably one of
those tenants at will, of whom Walpole speaks.
I will now turn to John Kane's father, Bernard, of
whom we have a glimpse in a tradition that has some
truth in it. In the year 1842, a drayman named Hugh
O'Neill, who claimed to know about the family, " hav-
ing been bred up in those parts," told Judge Kane that
" Bernard Kane of Sharvaugh, County Antrim, was of
the most ancient family of Ireland, not the' Derry
family. He was a Catholic, and his estates, which
extended from the sea to the River Bann, including
Upper Mullin, Dunloy, Isteburn, etc., were confiscated
on account of his religion. His castle at Sharvaugh is
now in the possession of a Captain Lang. To the day
of his death he kept a Catholic chaplain. He married
Martha O'Hara of the Crebelly (or Craighbelleugh)
family. His children were John, Barney, Mary and
Martha, of whom one married beneath her and was dis-
owned, Hugh thought."
The mention of Martha's marrying beneath her,
29
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
recalls to my mind a story of an ancestress of mine whose
disowned daughter crept back into the house to see her
dying mother, who raised herself on her pillows to
curse her. It seems to me that her offence was marrying
a Protestant. Later on I shall speak of her and of
Sharvaugh, for, now, I am going to speak of John
Kane's maternal ancestry. But I must first say that the
confiscated estates must have belonged to the clan of
the O'Kanes of the Routes in Antrim, not to Bernard
personally. As I have quoted from Walpole, the land-
owners had all been dispossessed of their great estates
before his day.
30
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY.
In the preceding pages I have spoken of the two
great branches of the O'Neills, and told how Sir Donal
O'Cahan was son-in-law to Hugh, the second and last
Earl of Tyrone, of the old creation. The closing years
of their tragic lives were from 1608 to 1627. In 1617
died the head of the other, and thereafter prosperous,
branch of the O'Neills, Sir Shane (Shane means John) .
It was he to whom Elizabeth, the English Queen,
granted part of the lands of his father, Brian, the last
Lord of Clanaboy, and upon the ruins of the old castle
of Eden-duff-cairgh, burnt by Essex, Sir Shane built
Shane's Castle — a place more than once destroyed by
fire and rebuilt, but still in the possession of descendants
of his in the female line, to whom permission was
granted to assume the name and arms of O'Neill. How
the O'Neills of 1600 would have raged could they have
foreseen that these descendants would also be descend-
ants of the hated Lord Deputy, Sir Arthur Chichester!
Sir Shane's first wife was a grand-daughter of Earl
Hugh O'Neill, and niece by marriage of Donal Ballach
O'Kane. Her only son left an only daughter Rose, who
became Marchioness of Antrim. At her death in 1709
the estates reverted to the descendants of Sir Shane's
second wife, Anne O'Neill, daughter of Bryan Carragh
O'Neill of Loughinsholin. By her he had two sons,
Arthur and Phelim. The two brothers married two
sisters. The elder, Arthur, married Grace, daughter of
31
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
Cathal O'Hara of Crebilly, and Phelim married her
sister Shela (Anglice Cecilia).
Arthur's three sons died, leaving no children. One
son died in 1716. The estate then passed to the de-
scendants of his brother, Phelim Dufif, and his wife,
Shela O'Hara, the other daughter of Cathal O'Hara
of Crebilly. I want particular attention paid to this title,
O'Hara of Crebilly. The O'Haras are not an old family
in Antrim (old, that is, in the Irish sense of a thousand
years' residence in a place). They belong, I believe,
to Sligo. A certain daughter of Cormac O'Hara, of
Coolany and Annaghmore, Co. Sligo, married a
husband who took her name and arms. Their son
Charles O'Hara, of O'Hara Brook in Antrim, was
High Sherifif of that County in 1752, and was probably
of the same family as the O'Haras of Crebelly. They
are the only O'Haras of Antrim mentioned in Walford's
" County Families of the United Kingdom," or Burke's
" Landed Gentry." Crebelly is an estate within two
miles of Ballymena, and, like Shane's Castle, is in the
hands of heritors in the female line who took the name
and arms of O'Hara on succeeding to the estate. These
O'Haras have several times intermarried with the
Shane's Castle O'Neills.
Phelim Duff O'Neill and Shela O'Hara had four
daughters (according to Burke's Peerage and Baronet-
age), Rose, Sarah, Maria and Eleanora, and two sons —
Brian, from whom the Viscounts O'Neill are de-
scended, and Arthur, who married Eleanor O'Neill,
daughter of Henry O'Neill of Ballynisneleary, and had
two sons, Felix and Daniel, and two daughters, Kather-
32
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
ine (Mrs. O'Hara) and Rose. Here, then, are two
Rose O'Neills, daughter and grand-daughter of Cecilia
O'Hara of Crebelly. The younger has a sister Kather-
ine, who is a Mrs. O'Hara. One of these Rose O'Neills
I believe to have been the ancestress of John Kane. The
brother, Brian, of the first Rose, had a son, " French
John," who died in 1739, leaving a disinherited son,
Henry, and a second son, Charles, whose son, John
O'Neill, was the first Viscount. This Right Hon. John
O'Neill was the kinsman whom John Kane visited at
Shane's Castle in 1784 or 1785. My aunt, Charlotte
(Kane) Heyworth, visiting John Kane's nephew by
marriage, Archibald Morrison, was told by him at
Eton Hall in England, Feb. 6, 1838, that "When our
grandfather was last in England, I suppose some fifty
years ago, he went over to see his mother — then a very
old lady of 82, who lived at that time with her rela-
tive. Lord O'Neill, at Shane's Castle." My great
uncle, James Kane, writes, "Albany, Sept. 6, 1842,"
speaking of his father, John, our immigrating ancestor,
" In one of his visits to Ireland with his brother. Captain
Kane from London, to see old maiden sister Mary,
who, it appears, at that time occupied one of the wings
of Shane's Castle, which was owned and occupied by
her nephew or grand-nephew, John O'Neale." In my
father's (William Wood's) diary of his wedding jour-
ney, under the date of October 6, 1830, he writes : " Mr.
Oliver Kane" (of Albany, N. Y.) "seemed to be a
very pleasant old gentleman, who told me that his
father (John K.) was next heir but one to the Shane's
Castle Estate (Lord O'Neill's) in Ireland, and came
33
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
out to America very young, having been sent out of the
way by the other claimants of the Shane's Castle prop-
erty." Under date of 1831, my father says in his Auto-
biography that Malcolm Morrison, who married Mary
Kent, " had an estate in the Dover Valley, contiguous
to John Kane's, which latter was called Sharvognes,
after a place his father, Bernard Kane, had in Ireland,
now forming part of Lord O'Neill's Shane's Castle
property." Mr. John O'Hara, Mrs. Bernard Kane's
grandson and John Kane's nephew, writes, he being
about seventy at the time. May 31, 1852: " I am old
enough to remember him and his younger brother,
Bernard O'Kane, coming to visit their mother at
Crebelly, about 1784, or 1785." He continues, " Mrs.
O'Kane (John's mother) died at Crebelly in the year
1802 or 1803, and was buried in a vault at Kells, built
by her only brother, Charles O'Hara of Sharvognes,
and Oliver O'Hara of Leminary, the uncle of Colonel
O'Hara, who was then the proprietor of the Crebelly
estate." This vault at Kells was in existence in 1883,
when a relation of Sabina Wood's, a Mr. Young of
Kilgorm Castle, wrote that it merely bore the inscrip-
tion on the door of the old vault, " Many of the O'Hara
family are buried here." Kells is a small place in
Antrim, four miles from Ballymena, Sharvognes is four
miles from Ballymena and five from Randalstown.
Crebelly is about two miles from Ballymena, and Mr.
Redmond, Sabina Wood's father, told me that when he
was a boy he had been to Crebelly to see the young
O'Haras mounting in the court to go on a fox-hunt.
34
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
These were probably some of the Hamilton O'Haras,
the old line having died out.
I think the extracts I have given sufficiently prove
that Martha O'Kane, John's mother, wife of Bernard,
born Martha O'Hara, was of the O'Haras of Crebelly.
(I may add that Judge Kane encountered in the year
1842 a drayman named Hugh O'Neill, who claimed to
know all about the family, and certainly knew their
names. He said that Bernard O'Kane married Martha
O'Hara of the Craighbelieugh — Crebelly — family.)
Particularly the fact of her burial in a vault built by
her brother Charles O'Hara, and Oliver O'Hara of
Leminary, uncle of the Colonel O'Hara, who was then
owner of Crebilly. Martha O'Hara, above named, was
the daughter of Captain O'Hara and of Martha Kane.
Her father was probably a younger brother of the
owner of Crebelly, since a younger brother's portion
was often " the price of a pair of colours," and his son,
Charles, was of Sharvognes, not Crebelly. Martha
O'Hara, who married Bernard Kane, was herself the
daughter of Captain O'Hara and of Martha Kane.
Martha O'Kane's father was O Kane, " and her mother
was Rose O'Neill of the Shane's Castle family, or
rather of the O'Neills of Tyrone," according to John
O'Hara's letter.
Now, Mrs. Bernard O'Kane was born about 1704,
and her date corresponded with that of French John
O'Neill who died in 1739, when her son John was five
years old. French John's first cousin was Rose O'Neill,
whose sister Katherine became a Mrs. O'Hara. These
ladies had an Aunt Rose, daughter of Shela O'Hara
35
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
of Crebilly and Phelim dubh O'Neill. It is this Rose
whom I take to be thq Rose O'Neill who married
O'Kane in our genealogy. She corresponds chronologi-
cally ^ with our ancestors. She also was a descendant
of the Crebeliy O'Haras, and her niece Katherine is
said to have married an O'Hara, probably again of the
Crebeliy stem. Her brother Brian was the heir to the
Shane's Castle estate. His son, French John, disin-
herited his elder son Henry, and if there is any truth
whatever in the story that John Kane was sent ofif by
the other claimants of the O'Neill estate in 1754, it
could only have been if there had been a possibility of
French John's second son Charles dying childless, in
which case, as he had disinherited his elder son, the title
to the estates would have reverted to the other descend-
ants of his, i.e., French John's grandfather, Phelim dubh
O'Neill and Shela O'Hara. Of these there were the
four daughters. Rose, Sarah, Maria and Eleanora, and
a son Arthur. As Arthur had two sons, Daniel and
Felix, as well as two daughters. Rose and Katherine
(Mrs. O'Hara) , I do not know why a descendant in the
female line should have been considered worth getting
out of the way. As it turned out, Charles, French
John's son, did have a son John, born in 1740, who was
created first Viscount O'Neill. It was he who received
Great-Grandfather John Kane as his kinsman at
^ Corresponding chronologically is a very rough way of estimating the
parallelism of generations. For Martha O'Hara O'Kane is said to have
been eighty-two in 1785. So that she must have been nearly a hundred
when she died in 1802, only six years before her son, John Kane. How
easily one might feel that in compiling a pedigree one must err in con-
sidering a woman who died in 1802 as of a generation earlier than a man
who died in 1808.
36
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
Shane's Castle in 1784 or 1785, and, if my extracts tell
the truth, had Mrs. Bernard O'Kane living there at
that time. I may remark incidentally that it is he of
whom we have an engraving, from a portrait taken in
1778, said to resemble some of our Kanes, and who was
killed by the " rebels" in 1798. (Charles also had a
daughter, Mary, who was married to John Hamilton
O'Hara of Crebelly, according to Burke. As she was
of the same generation as our ancestor, John Kane, it
shows that the O'Haras of Crebelly were already extinct
in the male line, the Hamiltons being descendants in
the female line who took the name of O'Hara with the
property. This Mrs. O'Hara being a sister of Hon.
John O'Neill makes the tie of kindred between John
Kane as a descendant of an O'Hara Crebelly still more
likely.) This first Viscount had two sons who suc-
ceeded him in turn, but the last one died in 1855, when
the estates passed to the descendants of the disinherited
son of French John, one of whom, also descendant of
Sir Arthur Chichester, took the name of O'Neill and
was created Baron O'Neill. The descent from Henry
the disinherited twice comes down in the female line.
John Kane had a kinsman, Daniel O'Hara, who
emigrated to Charleston, S. C, about the time of the
Revolutionary War, and had a son or grandson, Oliver,
living there. I note that in the O'Neill pedigree Mrs.
Katherine O'Neill O'Hara is mentioned as having a
brother Daniel. She may have named a son of hers
after this brother, and he would have been living at
the same time as John O'Kane. Note also the rather
unusual name, Oliver.
37
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
I do not myself think that the story relative to John
Kane's being sent out of the way as a possible claimant
of the O'Neill estates has a foundation in fact. I have
heard that he came out, possessed of a ship-load of
linens, and as Ballymena is renowned for its linens, it
may very well be true.^ He certainly did not come out
as a pauper, for he stepped at once into good social
standing, of which more hereafter. I have thought
that he may have received the linens, or the money to
buy them, in some compromise of the lawsuit between
the widow of Charles O'Hara of Sharvognes and his
sister, Mrs. Bernard O'Kane (John's mother) and Mrs.
Archibald MacNeill. There certainly was such a law-
suit. Mr. O'Hara writes : "Charles O'Hara, the brother
of Mrs. (Bernard) O'Kane, and of Mrs. Archibald
MacNeill, lived at a place called Sharvognes . . .
He was married, but had no issue, and died possessed
of considerable wealth, but he dying intestate, his
widow by law got the greatest part of it, and his two
sisters, being then both widows, got the smallest share,
after spending a good deal at law."
Why did they go to law if there was no land in-
volved? If English law prevailed at the time, I sup-
pose the division of personal property would not have
been difficult enough to create a lawsuit. The two
widows plainly got something, and as Charles Mac-
Neill, the son of one of them, came out to America at
the same time as did Bernard, the son of the other, they
* I have been given since this writing a scrap of fine linen edged with
lace, which is part of a handkerchief given by Martha Kane Livingston,
John's eldest daughter, to her daughter as having been brought out from
Ireland by John Kane.
38
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
may have equipped them and John from the proceeds
of their shares of Charles O'Hara's estate. My great-
great-grandfather, Bernard O'Kane, must have died
when his children were too young to be under his con-
trol. He is said, both by John O'Hara, his grandson,
James Kane, his grandson, his grandson Elisha's son
Judge Kane, and " the drayman Hugh O'Neill," to
have been an ardent Catholic. His son John was a
High Church Episcopalian, loving everything English
and hating everything Irish. He had had a college
education; is said to have been in an English college.
It certainly was not in Trinity College, Dublin, for T
wrote to the authorities there and ascertained that no
John Kane or John O'Kane was on the books between
1740 and 1754. Judge Kane in his Autobiography says
that " his grandfather certainly spoke English." I do
not know whether he meant that he did not have an
Irish accent, or simply a jest as to his speaking the
English and not the Irish language. But the facts of
his religion being Protestant and his prejudices Eng-
lish, point to his having been brought up under other
influences than his father's. That he named his Ameri-
can estate Sharvognes, intimates that he loved the Irish
Sharvognes, his Uncle Charles' home. That Mrs.
O'Kane adhered to the ties of her own blood is shown
by her dying at the O'Hara place, Crebelly, and being
buried in the O'Hara vault, instead of beside her hus-
band, wherever he was laid.
She was poor, or she would have been living in a
house of her own. Her son, Bernard, who held a gov-
ernment place in London after his return from America
39
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
in 1783, is said by Jolin O'Hara to have remitted money
to her annually. I am assuming that she died in the
O'Hara Estate house at Crebelly, but there is the possi-
bility that she had sunk to be a dependent in the house
of the daughter who, according to Drayman Hugh
O'Neill, married beneath her. This daughter, the third
Martha in the descent, is said by her son John to have
married "John O'Hara near Crebilly, v^ho died about
1790." He does not say that his grandmother died there,
but says '' at Crebelly." One must vs^atch for small
indications on these letters, and I think that if Mrs.
O'Kane had died in her daughter's house Mr. O'Hara
v^ould have said so. Speaking of his Aunt Mary, the
one unmarried sister of John Kane, he says she died
" at or near " Crebilly in 1823, vs^hich does not imply
a residence in the O'Hara Crebilly Estate House. By
that time Crebilly (spelled by old John Kane " Craigh-
belleigh ") had passed into the hands of the Hamiltons.
In the two letters which we possess of John Kane's,
addressed to his sister, we have interesting items of
family history, bearing upon and corroborating John
O'Hara's statements. One very curious circumstance —
curious at least to us who correspond with such ease
and cheapness and so frequently — is that John, writing
in 1804 to his sister, had evidently known nothing of
family affairs in Ireland. He writes, " My dear Sister,
I received yours of the 8th July, wherein you inform
me that you had wrote to me twice before. I assure
you I never received a line before the one I now
acknowledge, nor have had any direct information of
the death of my dear Mother, till my nephew Wm.
40
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
O'Hara told my son (who he saw in Philadelphia) that
the Dear Woman was no more." This letter gives the
history of his own family life in a way that shows his
sister had been in total ignorance of it.
Reverting to the mention of Sharvognes, Hugh
O'Neill the drayman, and James Kane, son of John,
both speak of it as having been the property of Bernard
O'Kane, yet after his death it certainly was in the pos-
session of his brother-in-law, Charles O'Hara. I
often wish we could ascertain from the brief-of-title,
which I suppose the Shane's Castle people possess,
whether O'Hara succeeded O'Kane in the ownership of
Sharvognes, or whether it was a mistake in transmitting
family history. T. L. Kane wrote to Johns, Hewitt
and Johns, lawyers of Belfast, in 1882, and received the
following reply:
Re O'Hara's Estate.
" The registry of deeds office for this country is in
Dublin where the records of all deeds and mortgages
affecting property in this country can be seen from early
last century. The record of wills admitted to probate
is also kept in Dublin, where all such wills can be in-
spected for about the last three centuries.
" There was no official registry of births, deaths
and marriages in this country until recent years. Be-
fore then registries were kept in the places of worship
belonging to the different parishes, but these were only
irregularly kept, and there would be very little hope of
obtaining information from these registries during a
period extending back beyond the present century.
" We know, ourselves, by repute, the O'Hara family
41
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
who live near Ballymena, but they have long since
parted with all their property in that district.
" Sharvognes is now, and has been for a long time,
the property of Lord O'Neill.
" Liminary is now, and has been for a long time, the
property of the Wardlaw family.
'' No doubt there was a lawsuit with reference to
the O'Hara Estate, although we do not think it was so
far as the date you mention, 1794 " (the suit the lawyer
refers to must be a different one. I fancy Charles
O'Hara died about 1754. E. D. K.), "in which the
O'Hara family were successful, and of course the rec-
ords of this suit could be hunted up in the Courts in
Dublin. We have not been able to ascertain any further
particulars with reference to the O'Hara family than
the above, and if we were to undertake to make the
enquiries mentioned in your letter, the expense would,
we fear, be exceedingly heavy."
This letter deterred us from proceeding any farther.
If we knew the date of the death of Bernard O'Kane
we might incur the expense of a search to find whether a
will of his was admitted to probate ; or if we knew when
Charles O'Hara died we might have the records of the
suit against his widow hunted up. But, knowing
neither, we could not afford a search over the great
time involved.
I fancied at one time that Charles O'Hara, as
Protestant, might have held the title to Sharvognes for
his (deceased or living) Catholic brother-in-law, Ber-
nard O'Kane, and that, acting as a trustee for the widow
and children, he had brought up the orphans: that at
42
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
his death, this having to be a secret trust, and he dying
intestate, his widow would not recognize the trust. The
pretty speculation fell to the ground when I remem-
bered that Charles O'Hara's other sister, Mrs. Mac-
Neill, was with Mrs. O'Kane in the suit. Mrs.
MacNeill could have had no interest in Bernard
O'Kane's affairs.
So the question of John Kane's heirship of anything
is likely to remain unanswered.
We now come to what we know of John Kane's per-
sonal history. He was born Dec. 12, 1734. He arrived
in America the 8th of November, 1752, and in 1756
married Sybil Kent, at the mature age of twenty-two,
she being then eighteen years old. What took him to
Dutchess County instead of remaining at the port of
New York? We have no clue. There was no large
city in the neighborhood, and he did not even settle
on the banks of the Hudson, then the highway of com-
merce. I find the birthplace of their eldest and of their
youngest daughter spoken of as Fredericksburg, and it
is no longer on the maps. I found it, however, on an old
engraved map in Spark's Life and Letters of Wash-
ington, and it is plainly the same place that Judge Kane
and Thomas L. Kane visited in turn when they were
young men, and that Katharine Livingston Schuyler
visited in 1897. The present house is now a pretty, com-
monplace modern dwelling, but Mrs. Schuyler says
that the kitchen is evidently very old: that there are
large old worn flagstones and an immense horse-block.
It is now occupied by a family named Chapman, and
is near Pawling Station of the New York and Harlem
43
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
Railroad, is in Pawling Township (formerly Pawling
Patent) , 65 miles N. E. of New York City and about
fourteen east of the Hudson River. Fredericksburg
was so called in honor of Frederick Philipse (father,
probably, of Washington's sweetheart, Mary Philipse),
from whom the region round took the name of Philippi.
The Philipse Manor was thereabouts. The land is
high: it is the region of the Hudson Highlands, and
the headwaters of the Croton are in the valley. " It
would appear that the country side, embracing Pater-
son, Southeast and Carmel (townships) was in the ear-
liest times called ' Woostershire.' It was also called
Philipse Precinct. There was also a still further dis-
tinction of the churches by their geographical relation
to each other, Paterson being known as the North,
South-East as the East, and Carmel as the West
Church." " The early churches in this region were
Calvinistic in doctrine and Congregational in polity,
although all eventually became Presbyterian. It was
natural that the people should appeal to the ecclesiasti-
cal bodies in the adjoining State of Connecticut, and
that the Congregational bodies should come westward
and foster the feeble bodies that sought their aid."
Therefore, the people of " Woostershire " " applied to
the Eastern Association of Fairfield County for a minis-
ter," and accordingly the Rev. Elisha Kent was sent to
them in 1742. He preached at first for both the Eastern
and Western congregations. Mr. Kent resided near the
Eastern church. It was a small log building, and stood
a mile east of Dykeman station on the New England
Railroad. It was probably built about 1745, at the
44
JOHN PCANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
same time as the Western church, which noble edifice
" was thirty-four feet long by twenty-four feet wide,
with one door on the long side overlooking the Croton
Valley. The seats were of slabs, into which sticks were
fastened for supports, and were without backs. A plain
box formed the desk for the minister, and the pulpit
seats were like the others." Rev. Elisha Kent's connec-
tion with the West Philippi Church was severed about
1750, and his labors were confined to the East Church,
where he ministered for thirty-three years. He died in
South East, July 17, 1776, in his seventy-second year.
He and his first wife, Abigail Moss, are buried in the
old grave-yard at South East, hers being the oldest
stone there. His second wife, Mrs. Raymond, sister
of Governor Fitch, the last royalist governor of Con-
necticut, survived him. They had no children. Some
idea of the salary that the Rev. Elisha received in 1750
may be gathered from the fact that in 1804 the salary
in the West Philippi Church was $130 a year. In the , , ^^^
Carmel Church on October 27, 1844, Rev. Henry G. r^^
Livingston preached his first sermon. He was fifth in
descent from Rev. Elisha, being (I suppose) son of
Rev. Gilbert, who was son of Gilbert R. Livingston and
Martha Kane. I have not the date when the (South
East) Philippi Church became a Presbyterian one,
but in October, 1763, Messrs. Kent, Mead and Peck,
pastors of South East, Salem and Patterson, met at the
house of Mr. Kent and resolved to form themselves
into the Presbytery of Dutchess. The little tract from
which I gathered these facts speaks of the earliest set-
tlers having come to that community about 1740, and
45
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
one of the pastors, Mr. Knibloe, speaks of the region as
infested by wild beasts in 1752. This same tract men-
tions Lucy Cullen, daughter of Rev. Elisha Kent and
widow of Charles Cullen, as living on Seminary Hill
in 1792.
" Priest Kent," as he was called, was a power in his
day. I suppose it is from him, or else his son Moss, that
the townships of Kent, in West Connecticut, and Kent in
Putnam County, New York, and the place, Kent Clififs,
are named, although his grandfather, Samuel Kent,
came from England to Suffield, Connecticut, in 1676.
Suffield is a place on the northern border of Connecti-
cut. There must be numbers of Kents left in that region,
as Rev. Elisha was one of six brothers. Writing in 1853
to Thomas L. Kane, Judge William Kent, son of the
Chancellor, says : " You can go in two hours by rail
(from New York) to Croton Falls, and thence by wagon
in an hour's time to the pretty little valley among the
hills of Putnam County, New York, where your great
grandmother, Sybil Kent, was born. The house where
old Elisha Kent lived is still standing, and a church
is erected on the spot where the old gentleman preached
for so many years. It is really a beautiful spot. Some
twelve miles or more north of this spot, still in the
State of New York, is the place where your great-grand-
father John Kane lived before the Revolution. There
were four children of the old clergyman living near him,
viz., his son Moss Kent (my grandfather), his daugh-
ters, Mrs. Kane, Mrs. Morrison and Mrs. Cullen. The
Revolution drove them all away, although those valleys
46
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
never saw an enemy's soldier.^ The European sons-
in-law adhered to the Royalist cause, while Moss Kent
was a Whig." Chancellor Kent writes, Dec. 13, 1841 :
" I have always been deeply impressed with reverence
for the talents, wit, piety and learning of my paternal
grandfather. He brought up his daughters admirably.
He removed from Newton in Connecticut into the town-
ship of South East in the County of Dutchess and prov-
ince of New York between 1742 and 1750, and there he
reared up his family among the hills and valleys of the
Eastern Highlands. He had a fine farm, and his
superior girls attracted in succession three foreign mer-
chants, John Kane, Malcolm Morrison, and Charles
Cullen, and one Scotch officer, a Lieutenant in the 42d
Highland Regiment (Grant). It was thought sur-
prising in those days that these four handsome and gay
Foreigners should marry the daughters of a plain and
stern Presbyterian divine. These families, including
my father's (he was a lawyer), formed an excellent
family society, living in succession about two miles
apart for twelve miles along the eastern borders of
Dutchess County in New York — all prosperous and all
genteel — and so they continued until they were dis-
persed and the charm dissolved and their fortunes ship-
wrecked by the American War.
" I was placed, on the 28th of July, 1772, at a Latin
School in the family of my Uncle Kane, and lived there
until May, 1773, ^^^ formed the greatest intimacy with
his children."
' An incorrect statement. — E. D. K.
47
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
The name of the resident tutor at that time was
Mr. Kalna. I have heard that John Kane overcame
the Rev. Elisha's objections to his marrying Sybil by a
display of his Latinity, which I suppose counterbal-
anced his being a strong Church-of-England Irishman.
He seems to have been anxious to secure a fine education
for his children, as he not only had this tutor, but his
daughter, Mrs. Morris, speaks of their old tutor, Mr.
"Stephen Camm " ("Kalna?"), following them to
Nova Scotia. Archibald Morrison, son of Malcolm
Morrison and one of Elisha Kent's daughters, gave to
my husband the following description of those early
happy pre-Revolutionary days (T. L. Kane was then
residing with him at Eaton Hall, Norfolkshire, in the
year 1840-41): Archibald Morrison "was sent to
school with his cousins John, Charles, Elias and Oliver,
to old Deacon Knapp's in Connecticut, where also he
had for playmate his cousin Jim Kent (the Chancellor)
and Moss Kent (second), his brother. Here he was
more distinguished for mischief than study, being par-
ticularly noted for a precocious kind feeling toward the
fair Yankee girls which displayed itself in his carrying
them all over the country on his pony, to the great
dismay of the anxious matrons of the district, notwith-
standing the entreaties of his father and mother that he
would apply himself more to his books. He would
return no other answer than by giving his cousin Jem
Kent (who was the student of the family) ' a good lick-
ing ' and reporting progress to assert his own cor-
poreal superiority."
48
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
Our ancestors, John and Sybil, had a large number
of children, born in the following order :
Martha Born March 21, 1758
John
a
Nov.
1759
Maria, or
Mary
Charles
((
March
31, 1762
Abigail
n
Feb.
I, 1765
Oliver
u
1767
Elisha
11
Dec.
2, 1770
James
li
May
27, 1772
Elias
a
April
14, 1773
Sybilla Adeline
Archibald
Sarah
li
Oct.
3h ^77^
Susan
11
1780
John Kane had an extensive business as a storekeeper.
His grandson, John Kintzing Kane (afterwards Hon.
John K. Kane of Philadelphia), writing to his father,
Elisha Kane, says, under date of Aug. 14, 1820: " I went
yesterday to Pawlingstown, and ate a bread-and-cheese
luncheon at the house in which you were born. It is
now a tavern and belongs to Gideon Slocum. His wife's
maiden name was Cook, and her mother was an intimate
friend of grandmother's. They treated me kindly and
would take no pay. The house is ruinous, and Slocum
intends pulling it down next year. I made a rough
sketch of the front of it. The extreme buildings are of
wood ; the connection stone ; the large building which
was the dwelling house has never been painted ; the other
is red. The yard in front is planted with poplar trees.
49
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
'^%.
The range of buildings is near one hundred feet long."
Extract from Judge Kane's Autobiography written
in 1850:
" While on my errand of survey and sale, I visited
the house where my father was born, and where Grand-
father lived before he abandoned the American cause.
. . . There was a large stone building, which had
been built for a storehouse, with family rooms above;
and this connected by a stone-covered way with a dwell-
ing at the distance of some fifty or sixty feet. This
covered way was lighted by windows, and formed per-
haps the principal feature of the series of buildings.
The dwelling house was of frame, clapboarded, two
stories high, and finished with some pretension to style.
I found it somewhat decayed, in charge of a family, who
carried me through it, and pointed out the room in
which General Washington had slept when he was the
guest (!) of my grandfather in 1778. The site was
a pretty one, but there were no trees remaining on what
had been the lawn, but some time-shattered poplars."
Mrs. Katherine Livingston Schuyler, who visited it
within the last few years, writes that she is sure that
the house she has seen is the original one, because the
people who live in it have given her many particulars of
the old woodwork, etc. " I wish," she says, " you could
see the kitchen. The horse-block behind the back hall
door is a curiosity. I should say it must be six feet
square. As far as I could see, the lower rooms seemed to
be all parlours, and the halls are fine." " The front
door is especially fine."
The number of openings is not the same as those
50
^
fi
^v
?5s
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
in one of the buildings shown in Judge Kane's sketch,
and the side building may be what he calls the stone
passage-way. The people living there were confident
that it was the old house. Judge Kane's first account
describes both the end buildings as being of wood, it
will be noticed.
Now, my descendants may reconcile all discrepan-
cies if they can. I cannot help believing that nothing
of the old place remains but the stone passage-way, and
that it is covered up by the present kitchen-wing. I
have heard this passage-way spoken of as " the
orangery," but cannot tell now who told me, probably
my husband.
Note June 22, 1904. In perusing John Kane's Me-
morial petition to Parliament I see that he describes his
house as " a large and commodious dwelling house,
containing ten rooms, a large Storehouse 65 feet distant
from the dwelling house, with a stone building of one
story between, which joined each." He enumerates " a
barn, barracks, stables, corn-house, shed, smoke-house,
dairy, etc." The farm contained 351 acres, and had an
orchard of 500 bearing apple trees, and 950 rods of
stone wall.
My husband, Thomas L. Kane, visited the spot in
1 85 1. He made copious notes of his visit, which 1
remember seeing, but they must have been destroyed
when our house was burned. I have nothing but the
short account given by Judge Kane in writing to his
Aunt Morris of this visit. He says : " My son Tom has
returned within a few days past from a pilgrimage to
the old confiscated homestead in Dutchess County, and
51
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
has brought with him anecdotes of your father and
grandfather Kent. In the days of Revolutionary con-
flict Grandfather Kane was not the popular man of his
immediate region. There are still living there some of
the men who hated and robbed him ; and they talk even
now of his overbearing aristocracy of port, and the
impudent daring of his elder sons, and the ardent jus-
tice that visited the whole of them. It is not easy to
believe in a personal hate still keeping up its bitterness
through three-quarters of a century; but there is a ribald
centenarian yet alive (I think this man's name was
Sears. — E. K. D.) in that neighborhood, whose blood
boils in triumph when he remembers the sacking of
John Kane's household property. Great-grandfather
Kent, your grandfather, has left a better, or at least
more cherished, name behind him. He was a stern
Old-School Presbyterian, and a sturdy Whig of the
earliest period: he was the great man of his parish,
the arbiter of all disputes, the controller of opinions.
His son Moss, the Chancellor's father, was a Whig
also, but of more plastic material than our ancestor, and
sometimes a little suspected of trimming his bark to the
wind that blew strongest for the time. In all this he was
the very opposite of his brother-in-law Kane, who was
ultra-Tory, ultra-Churchman, and not very moderate
in anything at any time. It is remembered of him to
this day, so Tom's letter tells me, that he could never be
persuaded to go to his father-in-law's meeting."
It is a curious commentary on this tradition that the
only record that I have seen of any sermon of Rev.
Elisha Kent's occurs in a letter of this same John Kane.
52
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
Writing to his son Elisha, 29th December, 1806, he says,
" When your pious grandfather bestowed on me that
excellent woman, your mother, he preached a sermon on
the occasion from these words — ' For this reason shall
a man leave his father and his mother and cleave to his
wife, and they shall be no more twain but one flesh,' —
and expatiated with uncommon power and persuasion
on the sacredness of the Institution, and the right per-
formance of the several duties enjoined on those who
enter it. His excellent discourse and fervent prayer
that we might walk like Zachary and Elizabeth in
the statutes of the Lord blameless, are still fresh in
my recollection."
Possibly the infrequency of his attendance on the
Rev. Elisha's ministrations kept John Kane from hav-
ing his memory of them dulled by custom 1
We know little of John Kane's prosperous days. His
son Elias, born April 14, 1773, was named after his
friend and business correspondent, Elias Desbrosses, of
New York. If I can find out what Desbrosses' line of
business was it will give us a clue to Kane's. Desbrosses
was a prominent citizen, since a street and ferry bear
his name still.
John Kane's children's names show traces of family
and friendly influences. Martha bore his mother's
name, John his own, Maria was probably named after
his sister Mary, Charles after his uncle O'Hara, or
perhaps his wife's sister's husband, Charles Cullen,
Abigail after his wife's mother, Oliver after an O'Hara
or O'Neill relation, though some think he was called
53
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
after Oliver De Lancey, with whom John Kane had
political relations.
Elisha was, of course, named after his grandfather
Kent, James was probably after a relation on that side,
as there was a Jem. Kent (the Chancellor), Elias after
DesBrosses. Sybilla Adeline, I fancy, was sentimentally
inclined, and adapted her mother's and grandmother's
Sybil Abigail to the requirements of the romances of
the day. She signed herself S. Adeline. Archibald
bore the name of John Kane's uncle by marriage on the
mother's side, Archibald MacNeill. Sarah I know
nothing of, but suppose it was after her maternal aunt
Sarah (Kent) Grant; Susan after Miss Susan De-
Lancey, or more likely after some relation. John Kane's
daughter Maria (who married Gov. Jos. C. Yates of
New York) died in 1798. Her husband subsequently
married Miss Ann Eliza DeLancey, and she was a kind
stepmother to Maria's only child.
When the political troubles began, which culmi-
nated in the Revolutionary War, not only was there
dissension between families, and individual members
of families, but men had difficulty in deciding with
which party to throw in their lot.
John Kane was elected one of the deputies to repre-
sent Dutchess County in the Provincial Congress of
New York Colony, Nov. 8, 1775.
Judge Kane, in his Autobiography, says, in speaking
of his grandfather: " He was a Colonel of the American
militia, became disgusted at an insult to his patriotism,
abandoned his property to confiscation and moved into
the British lines."
54
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
My father, William Wood, in the journal of his
wedding trip in the year 1830, writes that " Mr. Oliver
Kane, Harriet's uncle, told me that his father, Har-
riet's grandfather, was next heir to the Shane's Castle
Estate in Ireland, and came over to America very
young, having been sent out of the way by the other
claimants of the Shane's Castle property; that when
the American Revolution broke out he raised a regi-
ment, and at first fought for a time against the English,
but joined them when the Americans declared their
entire independence of Great Britain, and so got his
fine estate in Dutchess County, New York, confiscated
by the Americans, but the British Government as a com-
pensation gave him an annuity of five hundred dollars,
which was continued to his widow." This is such a
mixture of truth and untruth that one wonders how
Uncle Oliver had got himself to believe it. I have
shown how impossible it was that his father could have
been " next heir " to the Shane's Castle Estate, and
Uncle Oliver was grown up when his father went back
to Ireland, and must have known the truth. The con-
tinuance of the annuity to his widow is probably merely
the statement that the annuity would have been contin-
ued to his widow if she had survived him, as Captain
Gilbert Livingston's was to his widow.
Are we to believe that Great-Grandfather Kane did
raise a regiment of American militia, and did any fight-
ing? I have an impression that he was spoken of as
" Colonel " Kane, but cannot verify it.* His brother
* August, 1901. Since writing the above I have secured a copy of John
Kane's petition to the British Government, which explains all this, and
describes his house and property in detail.
55
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
Bernard was a Captain in the New York Volunteers,
and served under Lord Rawdon. Bernard had settled
over the line at Fairfield, Connecticut, Fairfield Town-
ship, I suppose.
The first authentic record of John Kane's doings is
that " John Kaine," at an election held in Poughkeepsie
in pursuance of a Resolution of the Provincial Congress
of the Colony of New York, Oct. 27 last, 1775, was
elected a deputy of the said County ^ to the Provincial
Congress appointed to meet in the city of New York
on the 14th of November. The other deputies were
PetrusTen Broek, Beverley Robinson, Cornelius Hum-
phreys, Henry Schenck, Gilbert Livingston, Jacob
Everson, Morris Graham and Robert Gilbert Living-
ston, Jr., Esquires.
The number of deputies was shortly " reduced to
three, so many failing to attend the meetings." John
Kane was probably one of those who did not attend
and were dropped.
In Smith's History of Dutchess County, page 345,
he says: " In the summer of 1776 an insurrection broke
out in the county against the authority of the Provincial
Congress. The insurgents went about in small num-
bers and disarmed Whigs, and at one time the insur-
rection was so formidable that militia came from
Connecticut to assist in putting down the revolters.
Many arrests were made, and the jail at Poughkeepsie
being full, some were sent to the jail in the adjoining
county of Litchfield."
From American Archives, Fifth Series, Vol. II,
° Dutchess.
56
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
page 1546, I copy: " Committee appointed for the De-
tection of Conspiracies, Oct. 22, 1776, for the purpose
of inquiring into, detecting and defeating all conspira-
cies formed in the said State against the laws of Amer-
ica." Of this Committee both John Jay and his brother
Sir James were at different times chairman, and my
husband had so bitter a prejudice against the name of
Jay that he even objected to my sisters' girlish friend-
ships with John Jay's grandchildren. He considered
that Jay had acted treacherously and ungratefully to
John Kane, but in what particular respect I do not
know. It is only at this time in their lives that I meet
with their names in conjunction. Probably Sir James
Jay was the hated brother. The Committee met at Fish-
kill Landing on the Hudson, a place about fifteen or
twenty miles from John Kane's house at Fredericks-
burgh, but where John Kane also owned a property.
Among the earliest entries on the minutes I find re-
corded the receipt of a letter from one William Mac-
Neill, dated Oct. 30, 1779, informing the Committee
that John Kane refuses to accept Continental money in
payment of a mortgage. MacNeill was an astute per-
sonage. He informs the Committee that John Kane
had loaned James Wiltsie £200 on his note: that
Wiltsie being unable to pay had given the said Kane a
mortgage on his farm. Subsequently he died and Mac-
Neill, his nephew and heir, proposing to settle his estate,
tendered £200 continental money to John Kane. Natur-
ally, John Kane refused to accept the depreciated paper
currency in return for his good money. No action is
reported as having been taken on the letter by the Com-
57
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
mittee. Probably Mr. MacNeill was known to them
as a mean and grasping man, for he shortly afterwards
reappears before the Committee, claiming money for
salt taken from him without due payment by the Com-
missary department. And, again, he wants a reward
for having, with another person, apprehended a certain
person who seemed to be a soldier, and who was offering
a horse for sale, presumably not his own. MacNeill
seems not to have received much credit or comfort from
the Committee, and he only interests us as being the per-
son who first brings our unfortunate ancestor's name
before the Committee.
Malcolm Morrison had married Mary Kent,
Charles Cullen married Lucy Kent, Alexander Grant
married Sarah Kent, and John Kane married Sybil
Kent. These brothers-in-law now all figure before the
Committee of Safety, and I shall copy the depositions
recorded in the Minutes, as affording quaint glimpses of
their family life.
" On December 20, 1776, Malcolm Morrison appre-
hended by Colonel Henry B. Livingston.
" Malcolm Morrison appearing and being examined
saith that last Tuesday week, one David Akens, one of
his neighbors, gave him a paper, which he put in his
pocket, and the next day or that evening read ; and that
it was a protection from General Howe; that he never
informed the Committee of his District, thereof, being
diverted by private business; that he never asked the
said Akens where he got it, or what induced him to give
this paper to the said examinant; and that on the said
paper's being demanded of him by Sloss Hobart, Esq.,
58
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
a member of the Convention of this State, the night
before last, he gave it to him, and that the paper now
shown him is the same; that the evening or the next
day after he had received the said paper, he communi-
cated the same to one Alexander Ridd, who had for-
merly been of the District Committee ; also to one John
Young, a saddler there, but to no other persons whatever.
Malcolm Morrison.
" Ordered that Malcolm Morrison be committed to the
custody of the Guard, and by them confined in irons.
"David Akins, of Fredericksburgh Precinct, Black-
smith, swears that on the 29th of November last he
set out from home with a pass from Colonel Lud-
dington to go to Horse Neck to buy rum," — goes on to
tell how failing in this, he went on to a relative's house
" near Brunx River," was arrested by a British major,
and asked how he could clear himself of having a
Rebel's Pass: " said he had come down on a particular
errand of Capt. Alexander Grant's wife to him, and
that if the Major would send him to Capt. Grant's
or Capt. Alexander Campbell's they were his old neigh-
bors and would prove his character." He had then
been sent under guard to Captain Campbell, whom he
told that he was a prisoner — that Captain Campbell
said he would discharge him if he carried certain
papers and would be secret about it. Further that he,
the deponent, understood that he had sent some a day
or two before to Malcolm Morrison by Widow Hen-
derson. That thereupon Captain Campbell gave him
two printed papers, which he did not read, and protec-
59
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
tions from Gen. Howe for Malcolm Morrison, John
Kain, Alexander Shedd, Mathew Patterson, Charles
Collins (Cullen — E. D. K.), and one for himself: that
the said Campbell entered into free conversation with
him, in the course of which he understood from the said
Captain C. that M. Morrison had undertaken to raise
a company of men for the enemy's service, and that he,
the said Campbell, wished he would be speedy about it.
And this deponent further saith that Barney Kane, a
brother of John Kane, is a Lieutenant in the said Camp-
bell's company, and that this deponent also understood
from the said Campbell that Malcolm Morrison, after
he raised his company, was to be under Governeur
Brown. That this deponent made the best of his way
home. That on his arrival there he delivered the pro-
tection aforesaid directed to Malcolm Morrison to
him; and that the said Morrison appeared much
pleased, and gave this deponent two dollars for his
trouble. That the Sunday after this deponent came
home he saw John Kain, and told him he had a protec-
tion for him, and asked if he would receive it; that the
said John Kain appeared shy about it, and in the even-
ing of the same day called at this deponent's house for
it, and the deponent accordingly gave it to him; that
the said John Kain asked the deponent where he got
this protection, and this deponent said he got it from
Captain Campbell. And this deponent further saith
that some time after, the said John Kain came to his
house and told him that Malcolm Morrison had
divulged the affair of the protection, and that the said
John Kain would fall out with this deponent and vilify
60
JOHN JCANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
him, but that he must not mind that. This deponent
also said that he gave the said John Kain one of the
printed papers above mentioned, and asked him what
he should do with the other, and that the said John
Kain advised him to burn them both, which he accord-
ingly did.
David Akin, Jr.
" Ordered that the said David Akin be discharged on
taking the oath of allegiance to this State." (The form
of this oath was stringent: " I do solemnly and without
any mental reservation or equivocation, whatever,
swear and call God to witness That I do believe and
acknowledge the State of New York to be of right a
free and independent State. And that no authority or
power, can, of right, be exercised in or over the said
State, but what is or shall be granted or derived from
the People thereof. And further, That as a good sub-
ject of the said Free and Independent State of New
York, I will, to the best of my knowledge and ability,
faithfully do my duty, and as I shall keep or disregard
this Oath, so help and deal with me, Almighty God."
It was enacted " That if on the said Oath or Affirma-
tion being tendered, the said Person or Persons shall
refuse to take the same, the Commissioners do forthwith
remove the said Person or Persons refusing, to any
place within the Enemy's Lines.")
Returning to the Minutes of the Committee on Con-
spiracies, Dec. 20, 1776, we find —
" Ordered that Colonel Ludinton be requested to
apprehend and bring before this Committee John Kane
61
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
of Pawling's Precinct, who stands charged with having
received a Protection from General Howe.
" Ordered that Charles Collins (Cullen— E. D. K.)
be immediately committed to the Guard House.
" Dec. 21, 1776. Present, Leonard Gausevoort,
Chairman, Zephaniah Piatt, John Jay, William Duer,
Esquires.
" Ordered twelve pairs of manacles and handcuffs.
" Dec. 22, 1776. Captain Hill appeared with John
Kane, who was delivered to him by Colonel Ludinton.
" John Kain appearing, and being examined saith,
that this day a fortnight ago, he saw David Akins, who
told him that he had something to communicate to him,
and desired him to call at his house, which he did to-
wards evening of the same day. When he arrived at
the house, Akins delivered him a Protection from
General Howe; that he inquired of the said Akins
where he got the said protection; that he answered it
was no matter; that when he returned home he showed
the said protection to his wife and daughter, who were
much dissatisfied with his having the said protection
and that his wife burnt it.'*
(Here we have, so far as I know, the only appear-
ance in print of Sybil Kent Kane. The daughter, of
course, was Martha, afterwards wife of Gilbert Living-
ston. She must have been about eighteen or nineteen
at this time.)
" John Kain further says that the protection was
never solicited by him, and supposes it was sent him by
a brother, who, he thinks, is with the enemy, and de-
62
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
Clares he is friendly to the measures America is pur-
suing; that he has never shown the protection to anyone
else, and confesses that he has been remiss in not show-
ing it to some member of the Committee of Dutchess
County; and further says that he and the said Akins
have been on very bad terms for a long time.
John Kane.
" Ordered That Col. Henry Ludinton appear before
the Committee."
" He swears that on Saturday morning about two
o'clock he received orders from this Committee for the
apprehension of John Kane ; that he called upon Cap-
tain Hill and three others who he took with him, and
repaired to the house of the said John Kane. When he
arrived there he found the said John Kane in his shop,
and immediately informed him that he was under the
necessity of making him a prisoner. That Kane said
he was surprised that he was ordered to be taken, and
requested to see the orders that the deponent had for it.
The deponent further says that upon Kane's reading
the orders he declared that as God was his judge he
had no such protection, and knew nothing about any
such thing. The deponent further says that Kane run
out very much against David Akins, that upon this de-
ponent telling David Akins to-day that Kane had vili-
fied ^ his character so much, Akins replied that he was
not surprised, for it was agreed upon between him and
' The use of the rather unusual word " vilified " in the testimony of
both Akins and Luddington shows that Akins was repeating from Lud-
dington and guarding against anything Kane might say to his prejudice
by asserting beforehand that Kane had told him he would do so, as a blind.
63
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
Kane. The deponent further says that Kane and Akins
had some conversation together at his house to-day,
and further that he met the said David Akins and John
Kane on the road together near the Long Bridge some
time the week before last, and that they appeared very
busy in conversation ; that Kane was leading his horse
and Akins was afoot." (Akins was a blacksmith: their
talk may have been about the horse John Kane was lead-
ing! — E. D. K.). "As soon as he, the deponent, came
up, they broke ofif. And the deponent further says that
among the firm Whigs, the character of Kane has been
suspicious (suspected?), and that he is in general re-
puted an artful, subtle man.
Henry Ludinton.
" Ordered that John Kane be committed to the Guard
and be put in irons.
" Fishkill, Connor's Tavern, Dec. 30, 1776.
" Mr. Jay communicated to the Committee a letter
from Ebenezer Cornell and James V. Denbergh, of the
27th of December, which was delivered to him by
Martin Cornell, together with a certain John Maloyd,
who they had sent to be examined respecting intimations
that he had given in his cups of John Kane's enlisting
men in the enemy's service.
" A petition of Charles Cullen was read, also peti-
tions from Caleb Archer, John Dickson and Samuel
Wood." These begged for leniency.
" Peter Noxon of Beekman's Precinct, in Dutchess
County, being sworn on the Holy Evangelists of Al-
64
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
mighty God, says that on or about last Wednesday
se'nnight, John Maloyd came to this deponent's house
in Beekman's Precinct; that he got a little in liquor,
and taking a pot of cider to his lips, said. Here's a
health to Captain Kane and his Company. Upon which
this deponent's wife said, ' What! is John Kane raising
a Company? ' Upon which the said Maloyd seemed to
be a little embarrassed, and said he meant a Kane in
some other County. That this deponent looks upon the
said John Maloyd as disafifected to the American Cause.
And further saith not.
Peter Noxon.
" Sworn in presence of Committee by me, John Jay.
" Dec. 30. David Clarke, a Corporal in Captain
Belknap's Company, being sworn, saith that he was
yesterday in the Lower Barracks in which John Kane
is confined; that Kane asked him what prisoners were
in the Upper Barracks; the deponent said they had
one Striker there ; that Kane asked if they had no others ;
that deponent said they had another; that Kane was
very anxious to know who it was ; deponent said it was
a man that worked for him, the said Kane, on which
Kane said, Maloyd? That Kane appeared very solici-
tous to know whether he had said anything about him,
to which deponent answered that he had not heard
Maloyd mention his name.
David Clarke.
" Sworn in Committee by John Jay."
John Kane passed seven weeks in Poughkeepsie Jail
in irons. In his Memorial to Parliament he says that
65
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
he was liberated on taking an oath not to hold any
traitorous correspondence with the enemies of the State,
and that he would appear when called upon. " That
your memorialist's house being situated near the
Theatre of the War, and in the great Route of the Con-
gressional troops and militia in going to and returning
from their Army, he was exposed to the frequent insults
of a licentious soldiery, and having chosen a convenient
time for the purpose he quitted his family and habita-
tions, and effected his escape to New York, being accom-
panied by two of his sons and a party of thirteen Loyal-
ists, one of whom was killed by a patrolling party of
the Rebels with whom they fell in at night, by which
they were compelled to abandon their horses and every-
thing they had with them, and with difficulty saved
their lives."
John Kane probably chose as a " convenient time "
the latest date at which he could avoid taking the very
stringent oath of allegiance passed June 30, 1778. He
entered the British lines Aug. i, 1777. His dwelling-
house was very conveniently situated as an officer's head-
quarters. It had a large dwelling-house, connected by
a stone-walled passage, sixty-five feet long, with a large
store-house building with living rooms above. The
Kane family under Sybil's charge remained at home
for some time longer, but General Washington occu-
pied a part of the house as headquarters for over two
months. In a letter of Gov. George Clinton to Robert
R. Livingston (Chancellor of the State of New York
afterwards, in 1781), Clinton says under date of Sept.
23, 1778, " Head Quarters was at John Kain's at Fred-
66
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
ericksburg." Spark's Life of Washington shows a map
with " Kingston " on it, and this was an older name for
Fredericksburg. The dates of Washington's own let-
ters show that his headquarters, with the exception of a
day or two, were at Fredericksburg from September 25,
1778, till November 29, and that John Kane's house
was headquarters is also shown by an entry in Wash-
ington's accounts of a payment for " use of his house "
to John Kane, Nov, 28, 1778, of $144. A bronze tablet
was put up Sept. 8th of 1905 upon the house in Pawling,
stating that " The residence of John Kane on this
Site was the Head Quarters of General George Wash-
ington, September 25 to November 29, 1778, while
his troops were encamped to the East and South."
The reason for Washington's troops being quartered in
this neighborhood was the position of the British troops.
A letter of his, dated from Fredericksburg, says : "There
are but two capital objects which they can have in view,
except the defeat and dispersion of this army; and these
are the possession of the fortifications in the Highlands,
by which means the communication between the eastern
and southern states would be cut off, and the destruction
of the French fleet at Boston. These objects, being far
apart, render it very difficult to secure the one effec-
tually without exposing the other eminently. I have,
therefore, in order to do the best the nature of the case
will admit, strengthened the works and reinforced the
garrison in the Highlands, and thrown the army into
such position as to move eastward or westward as cir-
cumstances may require. The place I now date from
is about thirty miles from the fort on the North River
67
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
(West Point) ; and I have some troops nearer, others
farther off, but all on the road to Boston, if we should
be dragged that way." In a letter to the President of
Congress, dated Sept. 23d, he says : " The army marched
from White Plains on the i6th, and is now encamped
in different places. Three brigades, composed of Vir-
ginia troops, part of the right wing, under command of
General Putnam, are at Robinson, near West Point, and
two brigades more, composing the remainder, are with
Baron De Kalb at Fishkill Plains, about ten miles from
the town on the road leading to Sharon. The second
line with Lord Sterling is in the vicinity of Fredericks-
burg; and the whole of the left wing at Danbury, under
command of General Gates."
It was either in this house or in its near vicinity that,
at his own urgent request, the court-martial of General
Schuyler for neglect of duty was held during the first
three days of October. The accusation was that he was
guilty of neglect of duty in not being present at Ticon-
deroga. He was acquitted " with the highest honor,"
says the verdict. The verdict, with all the proceedings,
was forwarded to Congress, then sitting in Philadel-
phia, by Lafayette, who had gone to visit Washington
in Fredericksburgh to secure his endorsement of an
application for a furlough to visit France, and also,
tradition says that Lafayette wished to fight a duel there.
He seems to have lodged with one Reed Ferris, whose
young daughter Molly was married to John Akin, prob-
ably the son of the very blacksmith who had brought
John Kane and his brothers-in-law those Protections
from Lord Howe, whose possession landed them in
68
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
Poughkeepsie Jail. It is a curious thing that facts in
the history of a commonplace family like ours should
be revealed to us by the correspondence of the Father
of his Country. Sybil Kane gave birth to her twelfth
child, Sarah, known as " Sally Kane," and to us as
"Aunt Morris," Oct. 31, 1778. Sybil used to say that
she was always a Whig in feeling, and her brother,
Moss Kent (father of the future Chancellor, James
Kent) , had openly espoused the cause of the Rebellion.
So I suppose that she quietly occupied one part of the
big house and Washington the other. Aunt Morris
speaks in her little memoir of Washington's headquar-
ters being in the house the night she was born, which is
a proof that Sybil, with her children, still remained at
home. I daresay that the paternal absence was cause of
rejoicing among the young people, for he seems to have
been a stern disciplinarian. Aunt Morris speaks of an
old Quaker saying to him, " Friend, thee must have
worn out a deal of hickory on those boys." Judge Kane
tells how, as a child receiving paternal chastisement, his
grandfather Kane came into the room. Accustomed
to the intercession of his grandfather Van Rensselaer,
little John was horrified to hear his grandfather Kane
say, " Lay it on well, Elisha, lay it on well. I'm sure
the little rascal deserves it." His son, James, describing
him in one of his letters to his Alida Van Rensselaer
(Kane) Constable, says of his father that his character-
istics were inflexibility and infallibility.
The first marriage in the family took place on Sept.
30, 1779, when the eldest daughter, Martha, then a girl
of twenty, married Gilbert Robert Livingston, also a
69
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
loyalist, whose father, Robert Gilbert, was a Whig. A
few days later, Oct. 22, 1779, the Act of Attainder passed
the Legislature of New York, at Kingston, in which
" John Kane, Gentleman," with Beverley Robinson and
a number of eminent Tories of the colony, were enumer-
ated, and all their property confiscated. Of this Act
Martha B. Flint, author of the " Early Long Island,"
says : " Nothing can be said in its defence. It was an
ex-post facto law, while the names of the persons against
whom it was aimed show that private jealousies, and the
possession of large estates which could be turned to
public uses, were the exciting cause of this legislation.
By it were adjudged and declared guilty of felony, and
to suffer Death as in cases of Felony ' without benefit
of clergy for adherence to the enemies of the State,'
fifty-eight of her best inhabitants — three were women —
eminent for high official position, for private virtues
and for distinguished ability."
When the Act came before the Council of Revision
— Chairman, Chancellor Robert R. Livingston — they
declared it to be " repugnant to the plain and immutable
laws of Justice; because obscure and contradictory."
John Jay, Chairman of the Committee on Conspira-
cies, before whom John Kane had been tried and com-
mitted to Poughkeepsie Jail in December, 1776, was
now Minister Plenipotentiary to Spain. From Spain
he wrote on May 6, 1780, to Governor Clinton: "An
English paper contains what they call, but I can hardly
believe to be, your Confiscation Act. If truly printed,
New York is disgraced by injustice too palpable to
admit even of palliation. I feel for the honour of my
70
JOHN JCANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
Country, and therefore beg the favour of you to send
me a true copy of it; that if the other be false, I may,
by publishing yours, remove the prejudices against you,
occasioned by the former."
Sir James Jay, the elder brother of John, did use
his influence to have the Act passed.
No sales of confiscated property were to be made
before the ist of October, 1780, and it would appear as
if there had been delay, as An Act for the Speedy Sale
of the Confiscated Lands was passed the 19th of May,
1784. Abstracts of Sales were to be made every three
months and filed and recorded in the office of the
County Clerk. The Act contains fifty-eight sections,
and made it impossible for the attainted Loyalist to
profit by the conditions of the Treaty of Peace, to return
to, or to re-purchase his own house or lands.
Sybil Kane's sisters fared no better than she did.
Alexander Grant, husband of Sarah Kent, a Lieutenant
in the 42d Highlanders, was killed at the storming of
Fort Montgomery. An Act passed April 23, 1785, de-
clares that Alexander Grant took possession of B. Coe's
farm in 1777, and that his family kept it till the peace.
To repay Coe for the waste and injury, the State indem-
nifies him from Grant's estate in New York, and allows
him to file a declaration against Grant's heirs, as Grant
had a large estate in New York. The widow Grant
preceded her sister to Nova Scotia, and some of her
descendants (Chandler by name) are still living there.
In one of T. L. Kane's letters to his father. Judge
John K. Kane, written in 1840 from Eaton Hall, near
Norwich, the English home of Archibald Morrison,
71
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
son of Malcolm Morrison and Mary Kent, he gives the
following account of the confiscation of Malcolm Mor-
rison's goods: "I have heard," he writes, "Cousin
Archie describe the scene until his voice choked with
sobs. His father, in heavy shackles, was tied against a
cherry tree that stood before the main stoop, compelled,
by a refinement of cruelty, to witness the beggaring of
his house. The furniture, the books, the very hobby-
horse which his little brother was clinging to, were
dragged out into the lawn where the auctioneer was
awaiting them. The bed on which his sick sister was
lying was dragged from under her; the old family ser-
vants were bid ofif to the highest bidder, and carried
ofif, tied hand and foot, as he says, like pigs carted off
to the butcher. One of them, * Old Violet,' who had
suckled some of the children, was whipped till the blood
ran down her back, because she clung to the doorpost.
Poor Archie, who had seen everything else in sullen
pride, could not stand this, but running up to her, burst
into tears. * Don't cry for me,' said the poor thing,
* don't ee cry for Violet. She not live long. See how
white her head is. She die soon and go back to Guinea.
Be a good boy. Take care of Mammy. Poor Missus,
she want Massa Archie. Good-bye.' Just as she said
this, one of the soldiers struck her a stunning blow over
the mouth and carried her off." I think that Cousin
Archie must have toned this story up a little as the years
went by, but even so it was very hard to lose everything,
even if Mr. Morrison was not in heavy shackles then.
He was ironed when in Poughkeepsie Jail, and his boy's
recollection of the two facts may have grown hazy under
72
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
the combined influence of the lapse of sixty years and
the after-dinner wine of " a good old English gentle-
man, one of the olden time."
Sybil Kent Kane and her children did not enter the
British lines till some time in 1780. I cannot give the
exact date, but it was probably early in the year. Helen
Evertsen Smith, grand-daughter of Martha Living-
ston's daughter Helen, writes to me that Mrs. Kane and
her family left before the Morrison's house was harried.
" They escaped by night to the banks of the Hudson,
and embarked by night under cover of the darkness
in a sloop which was waiting for them." .
There are some scraps of notes of a conversation in
which Aunt Morris tells Thomas L. Kane that her
mother queried whether she could keep her brown
horses, and John's gray. Her negroes, Cato and John,
each rode one of their horses into the lines. The Kane's
slaves, the notes say, all ran away without exception
from the people who bought them at the sale: would
not understand that it could pass any right of property
in them.
Sybil and her children took up their abode in a
house — an inn, I believe — belonging to a Mrs. Franklin,
at Newtow^n Landing, Long Island. General Skinner
had his headquarters there; Mrs. Morris thinks she
remembers a sentry always standing before the door.
Here in 1780 Sybil's last child was born, Susan, named
after Miss Susan DeLancey. Here, too, the family is
said to have been under the care of Captain Bernard
Kane, John's younger brother. Of him Aunt Morris
wrote that " he was a remarkably handsome man, who
73
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
stuttered terribly, from whom we have all, more or
less, inherited a hesitation in speech." We could hardly
have inherited it from him, but the peculiarity certainly
exists in many members of the family, as well as that of
a slight obliquity in the eye. I hope that another trait
of Captain Bernard's does not also belong to the family:
it is he to whom we are indebted for the statement that
" his uncle. Sir Richard Kane," told him that he could
trace his ancestry back to Branno, King of Lough
Neagh, who died in 272, and was the father-in-law of
Ossian. Great-uncle James Kane, who reports this as
having been told him by his father, John Kane, writes:
" Surely, my father," says I, " it isn't possible, and you
can't believe it; consider it is upward of 1500 years.
My son, says he, I don't know, nor don't care, but your
uncle Barney always insisted that it was true as the Book
of Genesis. It would not do, my son, for any man to
doubt or contradict your uncle, for he was not only con-
sidered the handsomest but the most powerful man in
Ireland, and he would make very little ceremony in
knocking any man down who even hesitated to believe
him. All I know, says he, my son, about these matters
is that Shane's Castle on Lough Neagh is considered
one of the oldest castles in Ireland, and is located on the
very spot said to be occupied by King Branno, and the
castle is enclosed with a high wall fourteen miles in
length on that beautiful lake, and the stables, sir, says
he, are equal to any palace you ever saw."
I would not have copied out this highly imaginative
statement, for, as I have previously said, " Uncle
Barney " was John's younger brother, and Sir Richard
74
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
Kane died when John was only two years old, but John
Kane speaks of Shane's Castle as if it had some connec-
tion with Uncle Barney's rhodomontade. Why should
he do so unless he had in mind a belief in the Kanes
being descended from the Shane's Castle O'Neills?
We do not know whether the Kanes remained at
Newtown Landing long. General Kane's notes men-
tion that John Kane, with the wreck of his fortune,
established two stores in Brooklyn and New York, but
the evacuation of the British Army forced him to leave.
He sailed for England at the same time that his wife
and children sailed for Nova Scotia. His object was
to present his claims to Parliament for compensation
for the confiscation of his property, and he had no time
to lose, as the time for their presentation was to end in
March, 1784. His final petition is dated in 1785. He
does not seem to have remained all the time in England,
but to have visited his family in Nova Scotia, and to
have gone to Ireland more than once to see his mother.
Of his experiences there Great-Uncle James writes : " In
one of his visits to Ireland with his brother. Captain
Kane, from London, to see his old maiden sister, who
it appears at that time occupied one of the wings of
Shane's Castle, which was owned and occupied at that
time by her nephew or great-nephew, John O'Neill, my
father, who was always distinguished for his remark-
able neatness, as well as temperance, was completely
overcome by the daily feasts and entertainments that
were given to him and his brother while they remained
in Ireland, and was rejoiced to get back once more to
his own dear England. He always represented his
75
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
friends and connections at the Castle and the country
around as a set of semi-barbarians. He said by the
fashion and rules of hospitality at that time among them
each gentleman was compelled to make himself beastly
drunk and to lay on the floor. He seldom spoke of it,
but when he did, it was with perfect horror."
John Kane's mother was living at this time, and his
nephew, Mr. O'Hara, speaks of his having visited her
at Crebelly, within his own recollection, about the year
1784 or 1785.
John Kane secured an annuity, he writes to his sister,
under date of the loth of November, 1804, of £80 a
year. At that date he says that he owns nothing else in
his own right, so I suppose he did not receive any other
compensation for his losses. Commissions in the army
were offered to his sons, which they would not accept,
although he urged them to do so. Mrs. Kane's nephew,
Archibald Morrison, obtained both pension and
commission, and married two rich English women
in succession.
The Compensation Act 23d George III, July, 1783,
provided for the payment of £50 for every £100 of an-
nual income. " Sir Guy Carleton is blamed for not
having secured the payment of debts due the men at-
tainted by the Act of Oct. 22, 1779. He appointed a
committee to examine their claims, but in a sessions of
seven months they did nothing. The failure therein
weighed heavily on rich and poor, reducing many
gentlemen from affluence to poverty, and those of more
modest means to absolute want." The Commissioners
of Parliament reported on the 6th of June, 1788, that
76
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
pensions had been granted to two hundred and four
loyalists, aggregating £25,784 per annum.
Writing of the loyalists who sailed to Nova Scotia
in the succe^ssive fleets that left New York from 1782
to 1783 in the autumn, M. B. Flint's " Early Long
Island " says: " England had meant to be generous in
her provision for those cast upon her bounty. From
three hundred to six hundred acres of land were as-
signed to every family; a full supply of food for the
first year; two-thirds for the second, and one-third for
the third year. Warm clothing, medicines, ammuni-
tion, seeds, farming implements, building materials and
tools, millstones and other requirements for grist-mills
and sawmills were granted, and given out with tolerable
fairness, but there were many delays, much poor mate-
rial, and errors in distribution which worked great
individual suffering, enhanced by the unexpected rigour
of the climate." " Official records show that fully
35,000 Loyalists went to Nova Scotia. Beverley Rob-
inson was President of the Board making arrangements
for their transportation." He was one of those gentle-
men named in the Act of Attainder, who remained in
America, and whose family always remained friendly
with the Kanes, but another, Oliver De Lancey, went
back to England and died there Oct. 27, 1785, losing a
large estate by his loyalty.
Sybil Kane and her sisters had their full share of
suffering. The Kanes " embarked," Aunt Sally Morris
writes, " in a large vessel bound for Nova Scotia. My
mother had with her thirteen children and one grand-
child — my eldest sister, Mrs. Livingston and child, were
77
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
of the number. We had a prosperous voyage as far as
the Bay of Funda — when a terrible snowstorm com-
menced and we were driven back to Cape Cod, and all
expected to be lost. The livestock — some fine cows be-
longing to my mother, and a superb gray horse of my
brother John's — were thrown overboard! We, how-
ever, arrived at last at Annapolis Royal, the ground and
the mountains around were covered with snow, and the
weather was intensely cold. My aunt, Mrs. Morrison,
must have emigrated some time before, for we were
all most hospitably received at her house.
" The next step of my most judicious and active
mother was to dispatch her two elder sons, John and
Charles, into the country to look out for a temporary
residence for her family. They succeeded in finding a
large rough-looking frame house, some five miles up
the Annapolis River. A gondola was hired and all our
goods and chattels stowed on board. My two brothers
and our two slaves (old Cato and young Cato by name)
undertook with a strong flood tide to navigate the
precious cargo to our new place of residence. When
the ebb commenced they fastened their great clumsy
boat to the shore, and went to a house nearby for a
night's lodging. But in the morning neither boat nor
cargo were to be seen. The frightened voyagers be-
lieved they had floated out to sea. However, they
divided into two parties, taking different sides of the
river, and went carefully along its margin, examining
every nook and inlet, and to their inexpressible joy the
gondola and all its contents were found safely nestled
in a sheltered little bay. How our good and pious
78
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
mother praised and thanked Providence for this special
mercy: all the provisions, clothing and money of the
family had been embarked on board."
The large empty house which formed so convenient
a shelter for Sybil's numerous children had perhaps
been the home of one of the dispossessed Acadian
farmers, for Aunt Morris relates that in her childish
rambles she frequently saw the ruins of old huts over-
grown with weeds, and sometimes came across gnarly
old apple trees, relics, she was told, of the old French
settlers. Indeed, the reason why Great Britain sent so
many of the loyalist families to Nova Scotia was to
replace the disaffected Acadians, whose love and loyalty
to France and hatred of the English, Longfellow has
immortalized and idealized in " Evangeline."
Sybil Kane remained in Nova Scotia with her family
for several years. I quote again from Aunt Morris :
" My next recollections are of a pleasant society,
scattered within a few miles of us, consisting of edu-
cated, respectable emigrant Tory families, ' poor and
proud.' Aunt Morrison and Aunt Grant's families were
in our neighborhood. Our young gentlemen used to
build bush-houses or sunny or shaded lawns, where
music and tea-drinkings appealed to my childish imagi-
nation as the perfection of enjoyment. Our old tutor,
Stephen Camm, joined us, and we used to meet in a
small church or meeting-house to study or recite lessons.
The boys studied Latin and read Chief Justice Smyth's
History of New York ; the girls read The Spectator and
The Rambler."
" We became acquainted with Dr. (John Prescott)
79
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
Lawrence, a most amiable and excellent young Boston
physician, who had served all through the war in the
British Naval Hospital, and was an exile like ourselves.
My sister Abby was an intelligent, cultivated young
person, who sang ballads sweetly. They fell in love with
each other and married." (This was in 1785.) " Within
two or three years after our arrival in Nova Scotia oc-
curred a domestic tragedy which in the 'dark backward
and abyss of time' stands out in terrible relief. Mrs.
Grant, my mother's youngest sister — the widow of
Major Grant, who fell at the storming of Fort Mont-
gomery — embarked with her only son (a handsome
youth of fifteen or sixteen) and Mr. Chandelier, an old
gentleman, his son and daughter, to cross the Bay of
Funda — that terrible bay, whose tides rise sixty feet —
to meet the British Commissioners to adjust with them
their various claims on the British Government, for con-
fiscation, losses and spoliations sustained by them as
loyalists. During a tremendous snowstorm their vessel
was driven on the clififs of the opposite shore, and the
passengers escaped to land by climbing along a rope,
stretched from the bowsprit to the shore, and after
climbing up broken precipices they reached a table land.
The two ladies were so exhausted that the men made
them a bed of pine branches on the snow, covering them
as well as they could with their coats, and then joined
in tramping round them in a ring to keep themselves
from freezing. When warm they would kneel down
and put the poor ladies' feet in their bosoms; — thus
they kept life in all till day broke ; — they then divided
in parties — the strong ones taking the lead. Old Mr.
80
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
Chandelier and his daughter followed through the deep
snow, piercing wind and bright sun (young Mr Chan-
delier was drowned in attempting to land). Robert
Grant and his mother travelled on all day together till
she became so exhausted that she said, ' My son, I can
go no further, I must lay down and die ! He had cheered
and supported her as long as he was able. He then
broke down branches of spruce and pine and made a sort
of bed and laid her on it, took off his coat and covered
her, placed himself by her side with her head on his
arm, and both fell asleep. The baying of a wolf awak-
ened him, and his mother lay dead in his arms! He
roused himself, covered her with snow to protect her
from wild beasts, marked the spot and set off alone,
under a waning moon, to find his way to the nearest
settlement. Within about two miles he met men with
a sledge coming in quest of them. He was so frozen
that he was placed in a bath of cold water and so his life
was preserved. The men followed his track and first
found Mrs. Grant; then at a little distance Miss Chan-
delier — sitting up, dead, in the snow — they traced her
steps to the brink of a precipice, down which her father
had fallen, eighty feet — the birds of prey showing the
spot. I shall never forget the Sunday morning when
the news arrived. My mother took her sleigh and went
first to tell the dreadful tale to the remaining Chandelier
family: the daughter became, for a short time, insane,
and my three young cousins, the Grants, were all but
distracted. The finale of this family was that Helen,
the eldest, became very religious, and after a time
married a respectable young farmer, fell into consump-
8i
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
tion and died. The second, Elizabeth (a very pretty-
girl), married the only surviving son of the Chandeliers,
and went with her husband and Miss Chandelier to
Halifax, where Miss Chandelier (who was not young
and had lost an eye) married Judge Haliburton.
Robert, and Lucy Grant, his youngest sister, came back
to this country. He graduated at Yale College about
1792, went to Savannah, and died there of consumption.
Lucy lived at Lansingburgh under the care of her
uncle. Moss Kent. Thus I believe the whole family
are extinct."
Aunt Morris is mistaken in believing the descend-
^ ants of Great-Aunt Grant to be extinct. Mrs. Kate
; Beeckman Schuyler met some of the descendants of
Elizabeth Grant Chandelier in Nova Scotia, in 1904,
I think it was.
The Kane family did not remain many years in
Nova Scotia. John, my grandfather, who was the eldest
son, was the first to return. Tradition has it that he one
day finished hoeing the last potatoes of the last row, and
throwing down the hoe declared that he had finished
his last day's work in Nova Scotia. Aunt Morris, how-
ever, gives Sybil the credit of sending her sons back to
the United States. She says that their father wanted
John and Charles to accept commissions in the British
Army, to which their mother strongly objected. " One
morning, after spending the night, as she has since said,
in anxious thought and prayer, she sketched to them a
plan of returning to New York. ' Go, my sons,' she
said, ' to your father's old commercial friends — they
know he was always an honest man — ask them to credit
82
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
you to a small amount — look out for a good situation
and commence business. I will draw on your father
for a sufficient sum to fit you out for the enterprise.' The
plan was adopted. They arrived in New York, called on
Franklin Robinson & Co. and stated their views, were
kindly treated — received credit to a limited extent, went
into the country — to Fort Edward, I think, and in a
quarter of the time granted them returned with the cash,
paid ofif every shilling, and opened a large account with
the house. They then wrote home the most encourag-
ing letters, and requested that my brother James, then a
fine, handsome lad of fourteen, should be sent to them."
This fixes the date approximately, allowing a year to
have passed in this adventure. James was born in 1772.
Thirteen years would bring us to 1785. Then followed
Elisha and Oliver. Elias remained at home some time
longer. He was a " mighty hunter," as his mother
called him, providing the table with moose and deer
meat, wild geese, wild turkeys, pheasants and so forth.
Elias and Archibald followed. Mrs. Livingston
had already sailed, taking her sister Maria, afterwards
Mrs. Yates. Then Elisha returned to escort his mother
and the two youngest sisters, Sybil Adeline and Sarah,
back to the United States. Sybil, the mother, exclaimed,
*' It is enough, my sons are yet alive, I will go and see
them before I die." Sarah Kane was then thirteen, and
the year was 1792.
Of the prosperous business established by Kane
Brothers, Judge John K. Kane says in his MS. biog-
raphy: "All the sons united to carry on business for the
general support. John, the eldest, was planted at New
83
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
York; Oliver, the fifth, sometimes in Europe, sometimes
with John. Charles, the second, was picketed out at
Fort Edward and Fort Anne: Elisha, my father, the
third, — Elias, the fourth, — ^James, the sixth, — and
Archibald, the seventh, — held a line of posts, beginning
at Albany, and running west to Canajoharie and Whites-
boro. My father was the pioneer. With Elias as his
aid at first, he built a log store among the Oneidas, and
afterwards brought up the boards from Cooperstown,
and put together the first frame building west of
Herkimer. It was at Whitesboro : I saw it yet standing,
a very large structure, when I visited Utica after I
came of age.
" In 1793 my father was living in Albany, the owner
of an immense storehouse and shop, in which he re-
ceived all the wheat and furs and the potash that his
brothers at the outposts could collect, and where he sold
the crockery and the broadcloths and the groceries and
ironmongery and everything else that Uncle Oliver had
bought in Europe or Uncle John gathered in New York.
The brothers were all partners, or rather there was a
unity of interest among them that never imagined a
separate property in anything. The sisters were part-
ners also so far as they had wants ; and when they mar-
ried, their outfits came from the general stock. For
years after some of the brothers had been getting fami-
lies about them, the partners of ' Kane & Brothers ' had
the same form of will for each ; — an estimated but fixed
amount was to go to the wife and children, but the rest
was to remain without account or inquiry the property
of the surviving firm."
84
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
Maude, an English traveller, journeying in America
in 1800, speaks of being hospitably entertained by Elias
Kane, and of the great volume of business passing
through Kane Brothers' hands, which was only rendered
possible by their absolute trust in each other, and their
possessing a chain of trading posts.
Among the Oneidas of Western New York, James,
the youngest, was adopted as a son of the old chief and
called Young Skenadore; Elias was called Tanatolas,
signifying Pine Knot, and Elisha, Caleotchico, "Great
White Cloud that Obscures the Sun," from his quick,
warm temper.
Kane Brothers, John and Archibald, had a large
brick building in Albany, a dwelling and storehouse
on the east side of Old Market Street (now Broadway),
(near what was the Exchange in 1857), says a writer in
Harper's Magazine for March of that year. I think,
however, that it was not John but Elisha who lived in
this house. The anonymous writer goes on to say:
" Archibald Kane had his hand very badly shattered
by the discharge of a gun at Canajoharie, where it was
amputated by Dr. Jonathan Eights. I remember seeing
him frequently in his store after the accident with his
arm in a sling made of a stuff resembling mohair."
Judge Kane told me that he recollected him as wearing
his ruffles drawn well over his wrists to hide the missing
hand. In Lossing's Pictorial Field Book of the Revo-
lution, Vol. I, p. 292, there is a woodcut of a large
stone building with a hipped roof, backed by a hill, and
having in front the small projecting building used as a
shelter in stormy weather. The text says, " On the
85
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
way to Canajoharie we passed an old stone house erected
before the Revolution, which was used soon afterwards
by the brothers Kane, then the most extensive traders
west of Albany."
The accident to Archibald Kane was, I think, a
genuine one, but the brothers were fiery tempered and
duellists. John became an elder in the Dutch Reformed
Church at Harlem quite early in life, and there is a
family legend that on one occasion as two of the brothers
wended their way to an early rendezvous, they were
aware of John, " Brother John " they always called him,
striding swiftly over the hills with his stick tucked
under his arm. He passed them by without stopping
longer than to say, " For God's sake, Elisha, re-
member that you have the honour of the family in
your hands." I do not doubt that the " Great White
Cloud " acquitted himself satisfactorily on the occa-
sion! In 1861-62, during the Civil War, when Lieut.
Col. Thomas L. Kane, Elisha's grandson, had to submit
the sketch of a work he was writing on Skirmish-
ing Tactics to Gen. Gilbert Totten of the Engineer
Corps of the U. S. Regulars, the old gentleman
greeted him most cordially as the descendant of
one with whom he had had " an affair of honour " —
to be recollected only in those later days with a feel-
ing of affectionate remembrance of the happy past. It
is well to remember the ardent, hot-tempered but gener-
ous Elisha of those early days. He and his aunt, Mrs.
Morrison, are said to have been the only ones who pos-
sessed the Kent humourousness. He became later a
pampered, rather lazy gourmand, I have heard, with a
86
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
shrewd tongue that could cut like a lash, and an inordi-
nate amount of family pride. But this I heard from
another Philadelphian whose Virginian father deeply-
resented Elisha Kane's *'Tory" exclusiveness. (Eliza-
beth, daughter of Dr. Mitchell.)
During these years of prosperity the handsome Kane
brothers and lovely sisters were marrying into the best
families in the land. I have only a few dates, but it
seems an odd thing that a family banished for their
loyalty to King George in 1783 should ten years later
be marrying the sons and daughters of distinguished
patriots. As the Old Northern Farmer in Tennyson's
ballad advised his son to do, " they did not marry for
money, but went where money was." John married
in 1793 the beautiful daughter of a rich New Yorii
merchant, Christopher Codwise; Elisha and Adeline
married the son and daughter of Gen. Robert Van
Rensselaer of Claverack Manor on the Hudson; Maria
married, as his second wife, the dull but prosperous
Gov. Jos. C. Yates of New York. Elias married
Deborah Van Schelluyne, a Dutch heiress. Charles
married Maria Wray, the daughter of the colonel com-
manding at Fort Edward. Oliver married Ann Eliza
Clark, whose father was Governor of Rhode Island,
and in 1799 Sally married Thomas Morris, son of the
distinguished financier of the Revolution. She has
given us a charming description of her marriage festivi-
ties, and her trip to her future home in the wilds of
Canandaigua, but as it is already in print I will not
copy it here. She speaks of leaving her father's house
in Schenectady in September, 1799, so I suppose that
87
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
John Kane and Sybil had a house of their own at that
date, but the few notices I have of their subsequent lives
and deaths would seem to indicate that they made their
home with their children. I cannot make up a con-
nected narrative, but from letters of the various mem-
bers of the family I will compile what will give us a
pretty good idea of their life. I have four letters of
old John's own. The first is addressed to his sister,
Miss Mary Kane, In care of , Crebilly,
Ireland, and seems to have been sent by hand. The
second is postmarked Belfast, and addressed to Miss
Mary Kane, Craighbelleigh, County Antrim, Ireland.
How they got back so as to reach my husband's hands
finally I do not know. The first is dated Albany, loth
November, 1804, and begins: " My Dear Sister, I re-
ceived yours of the 8th July wherein you inform me
that you had wrote to me twice before. I assure you I
never received a line before the one I now acknowledge,
nor have I received any direct information of the death
of my dear mother till my nephew Wm. O'Hara told
my son (who he saw at Philadelphia) that the Dear
Woman was no more. As to the favorable accounts you
have had of my circumstances, they are unfounded. I can
with the most solemn truth, assure you I have nothing
in my own right to depend upon but £80 sterling, which
I receive as a pension from the British Government
quarterly. My family (thro' mercy) are in prosperous
situations. I have seven sons, four are married, one a
widower, and my two youngest single. I have had six
Dauters (sic,E, D. K.) ; three are dead and three living;
two were married women, and my youngest in her nth
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
year. My Dauters as well as my Sons formed very
happy and honorable connexions {sic). One of my
Dauters left seven children, was the wife of a very
worthy man, a Dr. Lawrence, who was a surgeon in the
British Navy Hospital seven years in our Revolutionary
War. She died in childbed, about three years past;
the Doctor is still a widower, and so much attatched
(sic) to the memory of his departed consort and his
children that I think he will never marry again. His
son is now in his last year in college, and truly clever.
She was every way amongst the first of her sex I ever
knew. My dauter Mary, who I called after you, died
also in childbed. She married a Mr. Yates, the Mayor
of the city of Schenectady. She was also a fine woman ;
has left one dauter now about six years of age, a promis-
ing child. I have now 27 grandchildren; all promise
flatteringly; none as yet married, but my Dauter Liv-
ingston has two daughters and two sons, and my Dauter
Lawrence has left a son and dauter grown up. Three
of my sons have married wives, who, it's probable, will
have from 30 to £59,000 fortune each. My eldest son
John will have a very pretty one by his wife, who is one
of the first women of the Age. In truth I coud (sic) not
wish for more happy and honorable connexions than all
my children have made. I now have moved to this city
about a month past to live with my youngest son but one.
My youngest is now gone supercargo of a vessel bound
to the West Indies, partly owned by his brothers. Now
I have given you a faithful account of my family. I
am now a very old man. Should I live to the 12th of
next month I shall be 70 years of age. Your sister was
89
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
66 last July. I have reason to bless the Lord I have
never had an hour's sickness since my first arrival in
this country, vs^hich is 52 years the 8th inst., but I now
feel the grasp of the Iron Hand of Age. As to my son
Oliver's receiving money from Mr. Daniel O'Hara for
my Brother's a/c, I believe the intelligence is incorrect,
for I heard Oliver say Mr. O'Hara behaved very un-
gratefully in that Business to his Uncle, having never
paid anything.
" I now send you my Dear Sister £20 Sterling One
quarter of all the income I have on earth, and shall, so
long as I continue to receive the same annually which
will fail only by the Extinction of the British Govern-
ment, the best now in Existence or that ever has existed.
I have still a claim on it from which I hope to receive a
considerable sum. Pray let me hear from you as soon
as you can, and let me know what's become of Wm.
O'Hara. I hope he's not laid up in Dry Dock, likewise
who Mr. Henry O'Hara is who wrote me on the cover
of your letter. I can hardly think he is my old friend
of Leminary, whose life was so much above my own.
You'll likewise give my love to all who you think I
ought to recollect, and believe me to be with unal-
tered affection
" Your faithful friend and brother, Jno. Kane."
At the time when the preceding letter was written,
John and Sybil were residing with their son James, as
he says. I do not know whether he was still living in
the residence over the store in Market Street, Albany,
or whether he was living in the beautiful home, which,
90
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
I am told, his brother Oliver's wife purchased from
James after the failure. I find it described in 1830 as
" a splendid, old-fashioned house, called Kane's Place,
or The Mansion, quite in the country apparently, al-
though in the heart of Albany. There was a fine lawn
in front of the house, and fine old trees, with lots of
white-crested pet pigeons flying and strutting about.
You entered from the lawn into quite a large room, with
piano, chairs, sofas," etc., etc. This furniture, I may
mention in passing, is the old gilded cane-backed furni-
ture of which Dr. John K. Kane, of Delaware, and
Thomas L. Kane, of Kane, each inherited a sofa and six
chairs. How it became ours I will tell later on if I
have time.
In James Kane's old age he wrote many letters to
his niece Alida, and filled many copy-books with ex-
tracts from the books he had read, and with reminis-
cences of former days. Being poor, he economized in
paper, and wrote first in black ink along the paper in the
ordinary way, and then across in red ink. He wrote a
beautiful script, but it was so large as to nearly fill the
space between the lines, so that the capitals were little
larger than the small letters. Both inks have faded and
the paper has yellowed. The dear old man wanted
Aunt Alida to keep his MSS. and to turn them over
to his much-admired great-nephews, Elisha K. and
Thomas L. Kane. This is how they came into my pos-
session, for, in the rush and hurry of life, no one else
has had time to decipher them. I will copy now such
extracts as set John and Sybil before us in these last
years of their lives. There is necessarily some repetition.
91
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
James Kane was thirty-two at this time. Speaking of
the portrait of Sybil Kane (now in my possession), he
writes to Alida V. R. Constable : " You can have but
very little conception, my dear niece, what a treasure
you have furnished me with in my sainted mother's pic-
ture. It is placed alongside my bed and it appears con-
stantly to be watching me ' with eyes that seem to love
whate'er they look upon.' I consider it as my guardian
angel by day and by night, and it appears to me as if I
wanted no other society in my old age.
" My dear old father often told me that he did not
believe a purer spirit ever throbbed in a human bosom;
in the later part of his life, particularly, it seemed as if
he perfectly adored my mother. You know they were
unfortunately antipodes in their religious tenets, my
father being a high churchman of the strictest sect, and
my mother a Presbyterian. The children all went with
their mother, as her religion ' worked by love,' and
my father did not object to it, although he honestly be-
lieved that there was no salvation outside of the pale
of the Episcopal Church. But he was so kind as to tell
me more than once that my mother, he thought, would
be an exception. * * * My dear mother appeared
to be fully impressed with the idea that my father was a
Romanist — at the same time wisely kept her impres-
sions to herself."
"Albany, Feb. 17, 1849.
" My dear old father honestly believed that my
dear mother was not only one of the finest, but one of
the greatest women that this earth ever bore up, and
strange as it may seem, he had taken it into his head that
92
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
she was the very image of the King of Prussia in face
and expression — the ' Great Frederick ' whom he ad-
mired, if possible, more than I do Ossian. * * *
But what used to amuse me more than all was to see my
dear mother wince under all these high encomiums.
She well knew that my dear father was scrupulously
sincere in all he said concerning her, but you know
' nothing wounds a feeling and delicate mind more than
praise unjustly bestowed ' — such eminently was the case
with my mother.
" I recollect one summer afternoon my father came
into the Store with a splendid new edition of the Life
of Frederick the Great, which he had been purchasing
from the bookstore of Backus & Whiting of this city.
Says I, ' My dear Sir, I have got this work now in my
library.' ' Not exactly, my son,' says he, ' this is a new
edition, and is quite another afifair. I bought it purely
and entirely on account of the likeness it contains of
your mother.'
" On looking at it I must confess I became a little
frightened — I was apprehensive my dear old father
had at last taken leave of his wits; there was old
Frederick dressed in his royal robes — his gold-laced
cocked hat, star and sword, with his sharp face, keen
black eyes, &c. — and after looking at it for some time,
* My son,' says he, ' What do you think of it? Did
you ever see anything so striking? It is to me like the
reflection of a mirror; it is as much like your mother
as she is like herself; the face, character and expres-
sion,' continued he, * is perfect — ain't it, my son? '
" ' My dear father,' says I, ' I am extremely sorry
93
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
to differ with you in anything — but I must say the like-
ness doesn't strike me by any means as it does you.'
" I saw evidently that his countenance fell and that
he was mortified. In order to ease off with as much
delicacy as I conscientiously could, I told him, says I :
* My father, if my mother was dressed as that picture
represents, in the royal robes of his majesty, it would
unquestionably make a material difference in her ap-
pearance, and perhaps then there would be some
resemblance.'
" He appeared then to cheer up a little; the servant
came to inform us that tea was ready, and as we arrived
at home I found my dear mother sitting alone on the
sofa to receive us, and as I discovered from her eyes
that she was suffering from the ' hypo,' says I, ' My
dear mother, my father has been buying your picture,
and I am very sorry to say that the likeness don't strike
me as perfect as it does him.'
" ' My son,' says my father, ' I am very sorry to
hear you say so : it is as much like your mother as she is
like herself, it is like the reflection of a mirror; the face,
character and expression,' says he, ' is perfect.'
" ' Well,' says I, ' My dear father, if my mother
was dressed as that picture represents — I doubt very
much whether she would even know herself.' With
that the dear old lady rolled up her eyes, and said, ' Pray
let me see it.' Says I, ' My father, will you please to show
it' With that he came forward and presented it. My
mother at first turned pale, and I was apprehensive that
she was going to faint. I was close by her side. She
94
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
was soon relieved by a happy convulsion of laughter,
and at last giving me a look that I never can forget, said :
" 'My son, what will come next? ' Says I, ' My
blessed mother, I told my father that it did not look
like you.'
" ' Did you, my son? Oh, Jemmy,' says she, ' How
can you take pleasure in making such a fool of your
old father? '
'* Says I, ' My beloved mother, you mistake en-
tirely, and don't do me justice. My father well knows
that I told him over and over again, that it did not
resemble you.'
'' ' Well,' says she, ' Jemmy, then I am satisfied.'
" My poor old father appeared perfectly con-
founded, and could not undertsand what it all meant;
he never said one word.
" The effect altogether was most salutary. It com-
pletely drove away the hysterics from my mother, for
that time, to say the least, and in some measure lessened
my father's ideality.
" I always made it a point after that, whenever I
perceived my heavenly mother threatened with the
' hypo,' to show her that picture ; it rarely, if ever, failed
to dissipate it altogether."
"Albany, March, 1849.
" Now, what I want of you, my dear Alida, for
your old uncle's sake, is to let the poor ' Pope and Polk '
alone. The latter it seems has at length got his quietus,
and the former appears to be, at present, in trouble. I
must confess I do feel a strong sympathy for both those
gentlemen, and I cannot help feeling so, the former on
95
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
my excellent, respected father's account, and the latter
on my most estimable nephew's account, who is some-
times designated with the cognomen ' Polk Kane,' which
I am not ashamed, to say the least, always to recognize.
I recollect my dear father asked me one day if I knew
the etymology of the word Pope. I told him I did not.
' It means. Sir,' says he, ' Father, he being the father of
all Christians.' He firmly believed in the Pope's in-
fallibility. You know his father, my grandfather, was
a Romanist of the strictest sect, and if it had not been
for my sainted mother, I do really believe I should have
been a Romanist or at least an Episcopalian.
" Our ancestry, according to Uncle Barney's inco-
herent account, in which he had seen the very genea-
logical tree, as shown to him by his uncle (Brig. Gen.
Kane, governor of the Island of Minorca), was, it
seems, traced to Branno, King of Lough, or ' Lego,'
who was father-in-law of Ossian, and whose daughter
it seems the beautiful Everallen it seems he fell in love
with in one of his early journeys to Ireland. She was,
it seems, the mother of Oscar, who was her only child,
and both died before Ossian.
" It is supposed that Shane's Castle on Lough Neagh
occupies the very spot formerly occupied by Branno."
" My dear old father used to be annoyed : (I always
eat very quick when I was in business, and might be con-
sidered a hearty eater). I well recollect how it used
to annoy my dear old father, who was remarkably tem-
perate both in eating and drinking, and was fond of
sitting a good while at table and ate very slow. He
used to say to me, ' My son, learn to eat slow, and all
96
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
other graces will follow in their places,' and ' Let the
appetite or desire be obedient to reason ' was another
favorite maxim of his. I don't know as he had any
particular favorites among his sons, but if he had it was
certainly my dear brother Archy.'
" Speaking of Ossian's poetry he writes:
'' ' Where Ossian speaks of the death of his wife
" Everallen," our ancestor, according to Uncle Barney,
is quite poetic and fine.
" ' Gale of the veedy Lego, now called Lough Neagh,
on the borders of which stands Shane's Castle, still in
the possession of some of my father's connections.'
" My father, I think I told you, always invariably
kept all the Romish saints' days — such as Michael-
mas, Martinmas, Candlemas, Epiphany, Ash Wednes-
day, Lent and Good Friday, &c., &c. I recollect he
often said to me, ' My son, if you have any young friends
that you would like to be civil to, I should wish you to
invite (sic) them for such a day, say, for instance, the
29th September — I have been purchasing to-day some
fine young ducks, a green goose, pheasants, &c.'
" * What day is the 29th, my father? ' ' Michael-
mas, Sir,' says he.
" * Will you be good enough, my father, to tell me
the etymology of Michaelmas? '
" ' It is Michael and Mass, or, rather,' says he,
* Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and
the dragon fought and his angels, and were turned out
of heaven and driven to the lower regions, where I trust
they will always remain,' says he.
97
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
" ' Did that war in heaven,' says I, ' my father, take
place on the 29th of September? '
" ' Yes, my son, it did.'
" * Where do you find that fact in the Bible,
my father? '
" ' 1 2th Chapter of Revelations,' says he.
" I can now see my mother rolling up her heavenly
eyes, as she then did without uttering a word.
" I recollect one day I said to my father, ' Is it
possible, my dear Sir, that it is your deliberate opinion
that there is no salvation out of the pale of the Epis-
copal Church? '
" * My son,' says he, ' however painful it may be
for me to express it, that is my deliberate opinion.'
" ' Surely, my father, don't you believe my mother
will go to heaven? '
" ' My son, I do believe she will be an exception,
and " be saved so as by fire." As certain as there are
saints and angels in heaven,' continued he, ' so certain
your mother will be among them.'
" I told my dear mother immediately after that I
had some good news for her, and told her exactly what
my father had said. She said she felt herself infinitely
obliged at my father's good opinion of her, and that
she most devoutly hoped that my dear father would
go there, too.
" Well,' says I, ' my blessed mother, after all, don't
you believe he will?'
" She looked at me, I thought, somewhat signifi-
cantly — ' My son Jemmy,' said she, ' that is rather a
hard question for me to answer, at the present time.'
98
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
" It struck me at the time, I recollect, that my mother
had not quite as much charity as my father had. With
all my faults and imperfections, my beloved niece (and
heaven knows they are neither few nor small), I think
I can say with sincerity and truth that, during the whole
course of my long, protracted life, I have always en-
deavored to cultivate within my own bosom that charity
which hopeth all things and thinketh no evil, and in
some measure suffereth long and is kind, and that not
altogether seeketh exclusively and entirely their own,
and I trust I have found my account in it, by the tran-
quillity, comfort and happiness it has always afiforded
me in my various walks and vicissitudes of human life.
" If I were to be asked what were the peculiar char-
acteristics of my dear old father, I should say at once,
* energy and infallibility ' — there certainly ' was no
mistake about him,' at any rate, as far as I could ever
discover. I doubt very much whether he ever believed
that he ever committed one single fault during the
whole course of his long life. He certainly was most
singularly happy in that respect, and if it was my last
words I would say he was about as faultless as any man
that ever lived, and the only blemish about the dear old
man was that he was too conscious of it himself: my dear
old mother, on the other hand, was all ' meekness
and humility.'
" I recollect many, many years ago on Mohawk
River he was giving me an account of an occurrence
that took place between him and his only brother, my
Uncle Barney Kane, which appeared to me at the time
not a little marvellous.
99
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
" Says I, * Is it possible, my father, can it be true? '
" I shall never forget the dignified look he gave
me. * My son,' says he, ' do you suppose I should
say so if it were not so? '
" ' By no means, my dear father, and I most humbly
beg your pardon — -it only struck me as a little extraor-
dinary,' says I, ' sir.'
" After that I took special care never to doubt any-
thing that came from his lips till the day of his death.
He was a great lover and stickler (sic) for truth in
every sense of the word, and with all his wonderful
' ideality,' which certainly surpassed any man I ever
knew, since the days of my early favorite ' Don Quixote.'
" He never in a single instance ' mistook his imagi-
nation for his memory.' I recollect he told me nearly
sixty years ago, ' Always bear in mind " Paul's " recom-
mendation to youth, which,' says he, ' is well worthy of
being written in letters of gold. It comprehends every-
thing, my son,' says he.
" ' What are they, my father? ' says I.
" ' Piety, modesty, truth, benevolence, temperance
and industry.'
" My father was a finished scholar, which none of
his sons ever were. The reason why they were not so,
no doubt, arose from the disturb'd {sic) state of the
American Revolution. It appeared to me that he had
all the classics perfectly by heart, and his memory was
like brass.
" Chancellor Kent and his brother, Moss Kent, told
me that he was the best Latin scholar they knew of, but
the Chancellor said he could beat him in Greek, and
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
I have no doubt he could, as my father never pretended
to be much of a Greek scholar. His Latin quotations
appeared to me to be almost innumerable, and he had
them at all times in perfect command, and he never
introduced them only when they were perfectly appro-
priate for the occasion. For instance, when he thought
he perceived the clergy were laying me under rather
too heavy requisitions, he would say,
" ' My son, I think it the duty of a good " Pastor "
to shear his flock, but he must not skin them,' and then
he always followed it in Latin, ' Boni pastores est tondere
pecus non deglubere.' He unquestionably had more
mind than any of his children, unless possibly it might
have been Brother Archy, who, my father always said,
had both mind and genius."
Letter from John Kane to Miss Mary Kane,
Crebilly, Ireland
New York, 23 Febr. 1806.
My Dear Sister,
I don't know how to account for your omission to
acknowledge the rect. of my Bill for £20 Sterling sent
you last October. I have been afraid that either your
death or its falling into other hands has been the cause
(I wish you immediately on the rect. of this to write me
and inform me of the rect. of my Bill and your rect. of
its amount) . I of course wish to let you know the situa-
tion of all the survivors of our family and their different
branches. I am now a very disconsolate man, having
lost my Dear Wife the 19th day of last June, lacking
one month only of 68 years of age. She was carried off
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
by a parylitic (sic) stroke. We had lived together going
on 50 years, had 13 children, of whom ten are living,
viz. 7 Sons & 3 Daughters. I have lost 2 Daughters in
child-bed. Mrs. Lawrence has left 7 children. Mrs.
Yates, one, now in her 8th year. Mr. is again married,
has 2 children by his present wife, by whom he got a
fortune of £50,000 she being an only child. Dr.
Lawrence will never marry again. If I had a predilec-
tion for one Child more than another it was for her.
She would gladly had your Company. She would have
done all in her power to have made the eve of your life
comfortable. Mrs. Livingston has 7 children, 3 Sons
and 4 Daughters who are among the first belles of the
State. My Son John has 7 children. Chas. 5, Oliver 2,
Elias 5, Mrs. Van Rensselaer 5, Mrs. Morris my young-
est child 4, Elisha Kane 3. He has been a widower
on 7 (I say — A. V. K. C.) 8 years, lives in Philadelphia,
and is a Bank Director there. My youngest Sons, James
& Archy, still unmarried. I am happy in all the con-
nections that my Sons and Daughters have made & all
are as prosperous in theirs I could reasonably desire but
nothing on this side time can now make me happy as
I have lost the center of attraction round which my affec-
tions hovered. I can emphatically feel what Dr. John-
son said to a friend on the like occasion that the con-
tinuing of Being was lacerated. I shall immediately
on the receipt of yrs, or hearing from any other Channel
that you are in the land of the living, send you my Bill.
I am now an unhoused wanderer after having for 53
years been master of my own fireside having broken up
housekeeping. I live with my children by rotation, &
JOHN JCANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
tho all are attentive & kind, I am still not in my own
house. Should it please the Lord to continue my life
till the 1 2th day of Dec. I shall be 72 years of age.
Which, with the loss of my dear wife makes me weak
indeed. My love and regards to all you think proper.
Your affectionate Brother,
Jno. Kane.
New York, 31st August, 1806.
Dear Elisha,
It has pleased the Lord to remove to the Mansions
of Bliss the immortal part of your precious Dear
Mother. She departed this life on the 19th June at
1 1 o'clock A.M. after having suffered for 3 weeks incon-
ceivable distress. I know how all her children esti-
mated her work, but when I take a retrospective view
of it, I am quite unable to do it Justice. She possessed
all the natural qualities of a very great woman. Her
fortitude, perseverance and industry were almost un-
paralleled, her just conception of the use of time made
her hasten to perform the different duties of her station,
not only with cheerfulness but an avidity which far
surpassed any Being, I ever knew or could conceive of,
had they not been daily practiced before me. She is
now gone to receive the reward of her labors, in the
possession of redeeming Love, the Consolations of which
I have good reason to believe she had long enjoyed and
justly appreciated, and has left me to lament the loss of
that comfort and support her many excellencies afforded
me and of which I'm sensible I was unworthy. Life
now seems to be a dreary desert as I have lost the centre
103
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
of attraction round which my affections hovered. No
place can now be home to me as none contains my dearest
wife, by whose superior judgement and understanding
I have been ever aided in time of need going on 50 years.
I'm not insensible of the goodness of the Lord in the
continuance of her life so long, which some may think
ought to reconcile me to her loss. This may be reason
but not feeling which none can know but from such
experience as I have. The above is merely a transcript
of what I wrote yr Brother John the day on which yr
mother died. I then felt my loss by anticipation only,
but now realise it every day more than the preceding.
I wish I could be reconciled to it from the well-founded
belief that it is her gain, but I feel myself unequal and
Nature prevails. You took notice in yrs of the super-
intending care of Providence in preserving so many
brothers from improper conduct. I have for some time
flattered myself that the prayers of your pious Mother
for her numerous offspring had been heard, and will
after her sleeping in the dust. When I reflect on what
she was and what capable of being and that had she
enjoyed the kind attentions and indulgence that were
her due she would have been blameless for with all their
reverse she was nearly perfect. I hope the Lord will
prepare me and thro' the merits of my Redeemer re-
ceive me when I go hence into the society of the Just
made perfect, where I am confident her happy Lot has
fallen, and where if departed spirits recognize their
quondam friends on earth it must add greatly (if any-
thing can) to their felicity. I can now sincerely adopt
a prayer I often heard made by your pious Grandfather
104
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
that the Lord would not suffer him to live to become
burdensome to his children and friends, for though
Man is fond of Life, yet a long course burdened with
infirmities is seldom desirable. My love to your dear
Children. I hope the Lord will make them a comfort
to you and a blessing to their other connections.
Dear Elisha yr affectionate Father
J no. Kane.
Extract from a letter written to Elisha Kane, by his
father and dated New York, Dec. 29th, 1806.
" I purpose, God willing, to start with your Brother
Charles tomorrow for Albany to arrange some little
matters I have to settle there, and think it probable I
sha'n't return for a month or six weeks. John is unwill-
ing I should now go, but I think the present will be the
most convenient time for me. He is truly a kind and
af]fectionate son. I think it's not very probable I ever
shall see you again. I was on the 12th inst. 72 years of
age. I hope my children will do me the justice to be-
lieve that few fathers of my ability wished to promote
the respectability &c of their families more than myself,
and what errors I committed proceeded more from
wrong Judgment than improper Design."
Dear Elisha, Sincerely yours
Jno. Kane.
These are the last written words that have been pre-
served of our Ancestor. Great Grandmother Sybil had
died at Red Hook Landing, at the home of her eldest
105
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
child, Martha Livingston, on the 19th of June, 1806.
John Kane died at the same place, March 13, 1808. It
was not long after her death that he joined her, and I
do not doubt that both were surprised to find how little
their religious dififerences amounted to in the " undis-
covered country."
Their son James says that while John was a strict
Episcopalian, their children all followed their Presby-
terian mother, " whose religion worked by love." I am
writing just a hundred years after her death, and, of all
her many descendants, the families of Maria Wetherill
Janeway, Dr. J. K. Livingston and Thomas L. Kane,
which includes myself as a granddaughter of Sybil's
eldest son, John, are the only ones who adhere to Pres-
byterianism, all the rest having taken upon them the
easy yoke of the Episcopalian Church. And Maria
Wetherill married a Presbyterian minister, and Dr.
Livingston was one, so that my children and myself may
be said to be the only lay Presbyterians left. In the
preceding generation there were many who were either
Presbyterians or of the Dutch Reformed Church.
Elizabeth Kane Shields' son James is also a member
of the Presbyterian Church.
John and Sybil Kane were buried in a lot belonging
to their son James, in the old Presbyterian cemetery
at Albany. He erected two neat Italian marble monu-
ments to their memory, and by his own desire was buried
beside them without any stone to mark the spot. I
think that graves and tombstones were removed to a new
cemetery some twenty years ago.
106
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
The brothers went on prospering exceedingly for
several years. From letters written by one brother to
another, Archibald seems to have taken a new line of
life. He had gone on voyages to the West Indies as
supercargo on vessels owned by his brothers. August
17, 1809, John Kane (my grandfather) wrote to his
brother Elisha in Philadelphia, enclosing a Bill of Ex-
change drawn by Armand, Paymaster of the Colony of
St. Domingo, on Mr. Charles Bruce, agent of the Gov-
ernment of St. Domingo, who resided in Philadelphia.
The bill was brought by Robert Livingston (son of
Martha Kane) . " He and CuUen have done very well,
and Brother Archy is doing extremely well. He has
had three ships arrived to him lately from London with
large cargoes since he left." Archy himself wrote from
Port au Prince, August 9, 1809, asking " Messrs. Elias
Kane & Co., New York," to insure 60,000 pounds of
cofifee, on board the Swedish schooner Emma, from Port
au Prince, bound for New York. Archy seems to have
made his home in St. Domingo. His loving brother
James saw him for the last time in 18 15. My son. Dr.
Thomas L. Kane, possesses a handsome old racing watch
bearing the inscription,
Archibald Kane to James Kane, 1795
We know no more of this bright and beloved young-
est son of John and Sybil than that a tradition exists that
he married a daughter of Soulouque, the " Emperor "
Faustin I. As this cruel savage was excessively black,
I fancy that the Kane relations knew nothing of Mrs.
107
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
Archy, but gave her the highest title they could. Some-
where about 1850 a gentlemanly young mulatto called
at the residence in New York of Aunt Morris (Sarah
Kane) , claiming to be a son of Archibald, and was coldly
received. He disappeared without going to visit others
of the family. Archibald died in 18 17 in St. Domingo.
James was very well of]f. He had the fine house I
have spoken of, and had invested in canals and roads,
and was heavily interested in the Guelderland Glass
Works, near Albany, founded by a Belgian emigre
baron. I find them spoken of as belonging to James
and Archibald Kane. They advertised " a very superior
article of twenty different sizes." James had also in-
vested largely in land. He was thought to be worth
$500,000 — a very large sum for that time. But the mut-
terings of the storm which was to engulf the Kane
Brothers were already to be heard.
President Thomas Jefferson, writing to Thomas
Leiper, my husband's grandfather, under date of Jan.
21, '09, says, "The House of Representatives passed
last night a Bill for a meeting of Congress on the 22d
of May: this substantially decides the course they mean
to pursue, that is, to let the embargo continue till then,
when it will cease, and letters of marque and reprisal be
issued against such nations as shall not then have re-
pealed their obnoxious edicts." He laments the policy
of New England, whose " doctrine goes to the sacrific-
ing agriculture and manufactures to commerce; to the
calling all our people from the interior country to the
seashore to turn merchants, and to convert this great
108
JOHN KANE'S MATERNAL ANCESTRY
agricultural country into a City of Amsterdam, but I
trust the good sense of our country will see that its
greatest prosperity depends on a due balance between
agriculture, manufactures and commerce, and not in
this protuberant navigation which has kept us in hot
water from the commencement of our government, and
is now engaging us in war."
Kane Brothers were in commerce, and Kane Brothers
had privateers at sea. Judge Kane, speaking of his
cousin Elias and himself at Yale College, says, " My
cousin Elias left college without graduating. His
father as well as mine had failed in business, or they
were already involved in the vortex which carried them
down soon after." John Kane, that is, the future Judge,
wrote to his cousin Elias, under date of April 28, 18 14:
" Elias, I have very bad news to communicate. Your
father has failed, and mine has been obliged to follow
him. I do not yet know for what sums, but evil report,
ever magnifying, says that your father was indebted
more than he could pay, five hundred thousand dollars.
This, of course, is false, though the amount is undoubt-
edly large." Aunt Morris attributes the failure to
" commercial disasters brought on by the Embargo,
Orders in Council, Berlin and Milan Decrees. " My
husband (Thomas Morris, son of Robert) , was so mixed
up with the Kanes that the ruin of one was the ruin of
all." They were not all ruined. Some of the brothers,
it is said by the descendants of others, accelerated the
downfall by withdrawing their own shares, and their
wives' property that had been invested in the business.
109
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
John, my grandfather, went down with the ship, and
was greatly blamed by the Codwises for not giving them
warning, and for allowing his wife's fortune to be
wrecked with his own. He subsequently went into busi-
ness in a small way as an importer and auctioneer. He
died April 22, 18 19. My mother, Harriet Amelia, was
his youngest child, and when my father first met her, in
the year 1829, she was living with her sister, Mrs. John
Hone. I do not know when her mother died.
This ends all that I know about my great-grand-
father, John Kane.
4^Ifzkji^
no
I
CHILDREN OF
JOHN KANE AND SYBIL KENT
THE ELDEST
Martha, born at Fredericksburg, N. Y., March 21, 1758.
Named for her paternal grandmother.
Married Gilbert R. Livingston, September 30, 1779.
Died April 17, 1843.
They had children —
Helen m. William Mather Smith.
Catherine m. Henry Beekman.
Susan m. John Constable, being his first wife.
Martha m. David Codwise, brother to Mrs. John Kane, 2d.
Robert died young of a heart affection, at Port-au-Prince, W. I.
John McP. died young, after graduation at college.
James Kane of Rochester m. Charlotte Landon.
THE SECOND
John, born November, 1759, died April 22, 1 819.
Married September, 1794, Maria Codwise. They had ten
children.
On 15th of July, 1795, Cornelia Adeline, married ist Rev.
Paschal Strong; married 2d Rev. John Smythe.
On 31st March, 1797, Oliver Grenville, married Eliza de
Gironcourt.
On 22d May, 1798, Maria Antoinette, married ist John Hone;
married 2d Frederic de Peyster.
On 15th January, 1800, Elizabeth Caroline, married Philo J.
Mills.
On 20th December, 1801, John VanRensselaer, died unmarried
in New Orleans.
On 1 8th August, 1803, Emily Augusta, married James Van
Home Lawrence.
On . . . 1804, Georgiana Maria, married Charles F.
Winthrop.
On . . . 1807, Charlotte Matilda, married Lawrence
Heyworth.
On 13th April, 1809, Harriet Amelia, married William Wood.
On . . . 181 1, James Archibald, died young.
112
CHILDREN OF JOHN KANE AND SYBIL KENT
John Kane or his wife must have been great admirers of royalty,
judging from their daughters' names, which follow after that of the
unfortunate Marie Antoinette, those of the queen of George III and
his daughters.
THE THIRD
Maria became the second wife of Gov. Joseph C. Yates, the fifth
governor of New York. She died in 1798, aged about 21, leaving a
daughter, who found a kind stepmother in Ann Eliza de Lancey, her
father's third wife.
This daughter married John Keyes Paige, at one time Mayor
of Albany.
THE FOURTH
Charles, born March 31, 1762.
Married Maria Wray, daughter of Col. Wray of Fort
Anne, N. Y.
Died August 31, 1834.
Their children were, inter alia,
John.
Charles.
Augusta (Mrs. Cobb).
Jane (Mrs. Chace of Boston).
THE FIFTH
Abigail, born February i, 1765, died August, 1801.
Married Dr. John Prescott Lawrence. Had seven children,
of whom:
John K., died young.
Charles.
Abby, married Hasbrouck.
Maria, married John Price Wetherill of Philadelphia.
John Prescott Lawrence, son of Rev. Wm. Lawrence of Lincoln,
Mass., and Love-nee Adams. She was the only daughter of John and
Love-nee Adams. Dr. Lawrence was a surgeon in the British Navy,
and as such officiated on board the Jersey Prison Ships. He met his
wife when both were in exile in Nova Scotia.
THE SIXTH
Oliver, born in 1767, died April 8, 1842.
He married Ann Eliza, daughter of John Innes Clarke, Gover-
nor of Rhode Island.
"3
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
Their children were —
Harriet, 2d wife to Rev. James King, left four children.
Anna, married William Russell, left two children.
Lydia, died unmarried.
Helen, married Samuel Nicholson. No children.
Oliver de Lancey, married Louisa Dorothea Langdon.
John Innes, married ist Clark, 2d Mary Kip, January
2, 1848.
THE SEVENTH
Elisha, born December 2, 1770, died December 4, 1834.
Married December i, 1793, Alida, daughter of Gen. Robert
Van Rensselaer.
She died in March, 1799, leaving three children.
John (better known as Hon. John K. Kane), born i6th
May, 1795, died 21st February, 1858.
Robert Van R., born August 12, 1797, died in 1812.
Alida Van Rensselaer, born March, 1799, married as his second
wife John Constable, whose first wife was her cousin, Susan M.
Livingston. Mrs, Constable died December 26, 1881, of apoplexy.
Elisha Kane married 2d the 29th of January, 1807, Elizabeth,
daughter of Abraham Kintzing.
THE EIGHTH
James, born May 27, 1772.
Died in the American Hotel, Albany, April 2, 1851.
THE NINTH
Elias, born October 20, 1771, died in Washington, D. C, Octo-
ber 3, 1840.
By his first wife, a Miss Leavenworth, he had Elias, born 1794,
who became distinguished as the first Senator from Illinois.
By his second wife, a Dutch heiress, Deborah Van Schelluyne,
he had —
Elizabeth, a very fine woman, who died unmarried.
Cornelius Van Schelluyne, died unmarried in 1851.
Louisa, died unmarried.
Sarah L., married Dr. Elisha Harris.
Theodore, married Caroline Sperry.
Mary, married Gov. Wm. Gibbs of Rhode Island.
Julia, married John T. Gilchrist of New Jersey.
114
CHILDREN OF JOHN KANE AND SYBIL KENT
THE TENTH
Sybilla Adeline, married Jeremiah Van Rensselaer, whose sister
Alida married Elisha Kane.
Their children were —
Robert, married Margaret Stuyvesant.
Alida, married Chas. Carroll, and was great-grandmother to
Virginia Wright Kane.
Cornelia, married Francis Granger.
Catherine.
Archibald.
Rutsen, married Virginia Hutchins.*
James Carnahan.
Jeremiah, married Sarah Hartwell.
THE ELEVENTH
Archibald, greatly beloved by his brother James, died in San
Domingo, November i8, 1817. Maude's "Voyage to Albany" in
1800 describes a visit to Archibald Kane in Canajoharie, where he had
a house and had for five years been in partnership with his elder
brothers, two of whom lived in New York, one at Fort Anne, and
two in Albany. He must then have been about twenty-two years old.
In the year 1804 his father writes of him as being then supercargo on
a ship trading to the West Indies, owned by his brothers. There is a
report that he married a West Indian woman.
THE TWELFTH
Sarah was born October 31, 1778.
Married Thomas Morris, son of the great financier of the
Revolution, Robert Morris.
She died December 13, 1853.
Sarah was married at her father's house in Schenectady, N. Y.,
May 27, 1799. Removed to their home in Canandaigua, then a new
settlement, September, 1799. Their children were —
Mary, born April 3, 1800, married C. A. Vanden Henvel.
Sally, born March 6, 1802, died December 19, 1848.
Robert Kane, died at Baton Rouge, June 6, 1833, of cholera,
aged 30.
* This lady, by her second marriage to Abraham Wright, the man from
whom General Butler took the spoons, became the mother of Hamilton
Mercer Wright. He married Anne Fitzhugh, daughter of Alida Carroll,
and their eldest child is Virginia, wife of Dr. Thomas L. Kane.
115
STORY OF JOHN KANE OF DUTCHESS COUNTY, N. Y.
Henry W., born 1805. Commander in U. S. Navy. Died
August 14, 1863.
Harriet, died November 7, 1882.
Emily, died December 6, 1884.
Archibald.
William.
Caroline, married John M. Stark.
William White, born 181 7, died November 15, 1865.
Charles Frederick (U. S. A.), born 18 19, died 1847.
THE THIRTEENTH
Susan was named after Miss Susan De Lancey.
Born 1780 at Newtown Landing, Long Island, in a house used
as a tavern, belonging to a Mr. Skinner. This was after John and
Sybil's home was confiscated. After Susan's birth Sybil and her
family sailed for Nova Scotia. Susan died at the age of ten years.
John Kane sailed for England in November, 1783, to urge his
claims on Parliament.
116